On September 19th, Sylvester Stallone returns to the big-screen as tortured Vietnam War Veteran John Rambo in the fifth installment, Rambo: Last Blood. To mark the occasion, we’ll be taking a look back at the franchise as a whole, looking at the fascinating 37-year history of one of Stallone’s most iconic characters. We’re now at the end of the retrospective run with 2008’s Rambo.
John Rambo didn’t see action on the big screen for a long 20 years. Across those years, the rights worked their way around Hollywood following the collapse of the original holders, Carolco. There is also the added factor of Stallone’s star-power waning going into the late ’90s and early ’00s following such box-office flops as the ill-judged Get Carter remake, Driven and D-Tox. Stallone also couldn’t land on a solid enough idea to spur him to put the bandanna back on. That all changed following learning about the on-going civil war in Burma.
The film finds Rambo living in Thailand, where he is as solemn, angry and bitter as he’s ever been, working as a snake catcher and ferryman. When he is approached by a group of missionary activists looking to head into Burma to embark on a humanitarian mission to aid the Karen tribes-people, Rambo reluctantly agrees to take them upriver. When the missionaries don’t return, Rambo heads into action with a group of mercenaries to find and rescue them from the cruel clutches of the Burmese military.
Following in a similar vein to Rambo III by taking a real-world conflict and shining light on it, Rambo is a film which takes its subject matter seriously, and does so in a very aggressive manner. Stallone, operating as director, writer and star for the first time in the franchise, does not hold back when it comes to the depiction of the actions taken by the ruthless soldiers of the Burmese military (the SPDC). From news reel footage to the action in the film itself, this still stands as one of the most shockingly violent mainstream films that I have seen, featuring scenes of village raids that include bodies exploding from falling mortar shells, dismemberment, child murder, sexual assault and decapitations.
The violence does have a serious intent, that of displaying the horrific atrocities at the heart of the Saffron Revolution in Burma at the time. Again, in a similar fashion to Rambo III, the Karen rebel fighters are shown to be courageous and righteous, and the antagonists of the piece are aggressively coded as the most deplorable, sadistic and evil people on the planet. It entices you to rally on Rambo and the mercenaries as they then go about taking out the military forces in a fashion that is almost as brutal as their enemies own actions.
This approach to the violence from both the villains and the heroes makes for an odd concoction. There is both the sense that Stallone is aiming to over-justify the violence on the part of Rambo and the mercenaries, but is also going some way to expressing that violence and bloodshed is an ugly truth of mankind’s nature, and that if you are going to do it, it may as well be in the service of taking out the baddest of the bad.
It makes Rambo the most nihilistic film of the bunch, one where even Rambo himself has seemingly given up hope for his own salvation, with an inner monologue as he forges his new machete stating as much (“War is in your blood… God’s never gonna make that go away.. When you’re pushed, killing’s as easy as breathing.”) This Rambo is quietly resigned to be embittered with the world, seeing war as an inevitability, it’s just the landscape that changes. As such, the film feels more driven by anger and pain than anything else in the franchise, at least since First Blood. Stallone’s hulking frame, snarling grimace, and brooding performance make this older John Rambo almost like a Frankenstein’s monster figure, forged in war that he now can’t seem to escape from. Quite frankly, he’s scary, filled with self-disgust at the knowledge that war is the thing he does the best. It makes for the most provoking depiction of the character since he first wandered into the small town of Hope back in ‘82.
For all its audaciousness in its approach to on-screen violence, Rambo is let down more by script issues than anything else. The dialogue is often a little clunky, some of the supporting actors are quite wooden, and the mercenary subplot feels more like a dry run for The Expendables, relying on cookie-cutter stereotypes rather than anything all that substantial. Yet it’s well-made, with the shocking action undeniably well-staged, complete with hot and sweaty visuals, and an intense score from Brian Tyler that skilfully works in Jerry Goldsmith’s themes.
Rambo is the installment of the franchise that I am the most conflicted about. It doesn’t shy from the brutality of its subject matter, which I can respect, but it undoubtedly leaves you feeling a little uneasy. It provides a thought-provoking version of Rambo but offers little in regards to its supporting players (you do feel the absence of Richard Crenna’s Trautman). It is an angry film keen to make a statement, but occasionally that aggression can make the whole thing feel a little over-wrought.
Yet, something about it really sticks with you. It clearly struck a chord with the Karen National Liberation Army rebel forces in Burma at the time, who came to use the film (which was banned in Burma) as a piece of propaganda to boost morale for their cause. It’s hard to think of other Hollywood films that have had that kind of effect on an on-going conflict that didn’t directly involve the United States, and in that the film holds a value that makes it a distinctly different beast from the rest of the franchise, and Hollywood action cinema as a whole.
The final moments of this film (spoilers, but hey, it’s been 11 years), see Rambo come full circle and return home to Arizona. A seemingly definite end to the case of Rambo gets reopened again with the release of Last Blood next week. How will it stack up against the rest of the franchise, particularly in the wake of its immediate predecessors’ bloody footsteps? It won’t be long until we find out.
Thanks for joining on this journey back through the Rambo franchise. Be sure to keep your eyes peeled for the THN verdict on Last Blood when it hits theatres next week!
