Expendables Filipino style

MANILA, Philippines - Gangster Lolo will make you laugh and remind you of the “recycled” actions stars in the hit Expandables movies.

Asiong Salonpas (played by Leo Martinez) and his band of “senior citizen” criminals, (Bembol Roco, Rez Cortez, Pen Medina, Soxie Topacio and Boy Alano) go about their lucrative criminal activities by staging successful holdup robberies in the metropolis. Their nefarious business is well-funded by Bogart (Rylan Flores) and Jim (Archi Adamos).

Things were going well for them until the Police finally caught them in a jewelry shop heist they were trying to pull through. Only Jack (Boy Alano) was able to escape.

 Knowing that the gang was able to somehow hide the loot somewhere, Bogart and his group began hunting Jack who was able to provide a map to Asiong and the others who were already in prison. 

While in jail, Asiong, Bembol, Rez, Pen and Soxie decided to turn over a new leaf and reform themselves. With their families rejecting them for being criminals and for some other personal reasons, they made caring for one another as “family” their lifetime commitment. Indeed, the prison management noticed their good deeds and in no time, they were free men once more.

With their families refusing to take them back and with nowhere to go, Asiong and his friends decided to live in the old tenement building where they knew Jack hid their loot.

Picking up the pieces of their broken lives once more, Asiong and his gang live their new lives in the tenement neighborhood and find themselves decent jobs. They make their mark as heroes in their place driving out criminal elements who were preying on the tenement dwellers.

Slowly things fall into their right places for each one of them.

The movie while delivering the old-school laughs and satisfying the right action adrenalin rush, also highlights the theme that “Crime does not pay” and the Golden Rule, “Do unto others what you want other to do unto you.”

Gangster Lolo, directed by William Mayo and produced by Randy and Marilou Nonato and Rylan Flores under their Cosmic Raven Ventures Productions, will be showing in your favorite theaters on Nov. 19.