I just got through watching Rambo, the fourth, possibly final, installment in the Rambo series of movies.
It’s been awhile; the last film, Rambo III, came out twenty years ago.
I haven’t seen First Blood, the very first film in the series (I actually intend to, just haven’t gotten around to it yet), I don’t really remember much of Rambo: First Blood Part II, although I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it all the way through at least once, and I know I’ve seen bits and pieces of the final act of Rambo III on cable TV, you know, when there wasn’t anything better on.
Let’s just say I’m not exactly a diehard Rambo fan.
To be honest, were it not for Rocky Balboa, the sixth and final Rocky film, which I rather enjoyed (I’d give it a 4 out of 5.), I would never have gone to see Rambo.
See, up until the week before Rocky Balboa came out, I had never even seen a Rocky film before. The trailer looked promising though, and I was curious to see if Sylvester Stallone could pull it off.
I ended up watching the first two Rocky movies. I didn’t have time to watch any of the others, and honestly, I’m glad that I didn’t; I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have cared for them much. Rocky Balboa is very much a sequel to the first two Rocky films and intentionally glosses over a lot of the material from the other, more cartoony sequels. It’s a fitting end to the franchise – I enjoyed it and recommend it, but you have to have seen the first two to really appreciate it.
Rocky Balboa the film, like the title character, certainly has its flaws, but the film has its heart in the right place and in the end you can’t help but root for it.
Having enjoyed Rocky Balboa, I decided to give Rambo a whirl, although this time without going back and watching the earlier films.
Maybe that was my mistake.
Simply put, Rambo doesn’t have quite the same appeal as Rocky Balboa. It’s not a terrible movie, although one could very easily see how it might have turned out that way. It’s decent, but unless you’re a huge fan of the series, I’d recommend steering clear.
Fan or not, it’s worth a rental if you’re just in the mood for a mindless action flick (I’d give it a 3), but there are plenty of other worthwhile films out there vying for your attention.
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The movie begins with actual footage of the horrible atrocities taking place in Burma to this day and introduces the ongoing conflict between the Burmese military and the Karen rebels, setting the stage for the events that follow.
The title character, John Rambo, (Sylvester Stallone reprises the role he made famous in 1982′s First Blood), now lives in Thailand, trapping snakes for a living and leading a solitary, peaceful existence, ferrying people across the river occasionally and generally minding his own business.
A group of Christian missionaries ask Rambo to ferry them across the border and into Burma so that they can deliver much-needed supplies and medicine to the people there. Rambo refuses at first; he’s convinced that the missionaries’ goal, while certainly noble, won’t have any sort of lasting impact and that the violence and suffering will continue.
The missionaries are all but prepared to give up, except for one: a good-hearted, persistent young woman named Sarah Miller (played by Julie Benz) who manages to convince Rambo to allow the group to continue their mission.
Ten days later, Rambo is contacted by the group’s pastor. The missionaries have been kidnapped by the Burmese army and a group of mercenaries have been hired to conduct a rescue mission. Rambo agrees to guide the mercenaries up the river and in the end helps to save the captured missionaries.
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As one might expect, there’s not a lot of dialogue in Rambo, and what little dialogue there is serves mainly as exposition. The problem though is not the lack of dialogue, or even the delivery (there are no standout performances here; the actors all do a decent job with the material), rather, with so few lines of spoken dialogue, the handful of truly awful lines simply stand out even more.
In the trailer, Rambo utters the cringeworthy line, “Live for nothing. Or die for something,” which might have seemed somewhat clever on paper (Sylvester Stallone wrote the script with Art Monterastelli) but doesn’t work in the context of the film either.
There’s a villain. If he has a name, I don’t know what it is. Like Rambo, he doesn’t have a whole to say. He wears sunglasses and smokes cigarettes and enjoys watching as captured villagers are forced at gunpoint to run relays through mine-laden rice paddies. Not a very nice guy, is he?
At the same time, he’s not exactly on the short list of candidates for the AFI’s Top 100 Villains either. Hans Gruber he ain’t. There’s nothing truly memorable about this baddie. He performs his function in the script, that of main villain, and that’s about it. When Rambo does finally off him, (Spoiler? What spoiler? Haven’t you ever watched an action film before?) you don’t really feel any sort of satisfaction at the character’s demise.
The plot, summarized above, is really that simple. Nothing else really happens. There are no clever twists, no surprises (not that you’d expect any), but most egregiously, no real complications to speak of; nothing happens to heighten the tension or add any sort of drama. There’s no suspense here.
Watching the climactic boxing match in Rocky Balboa, now that’s suspensful. I was genuinely worried that Rocky was gonna bite the big one finally.
The way it’s shot, the blows are just punishing. It’s almost hard to watch. You realize just how old Rocky is, and you wonder how much more punishment the guy can take before he keels over. By the time Rocky enters that ring, you are emotionally invested. You care about the outcome of the match, you want Rocky to go the distance with his opponent, and you want him to make it to that final bell.
On the other hand, you’re never really worried about John Rambo. For starters, the character’s not nearly as likeable as Rocky. I really couldn’t care less if he died while trying to rescue the captured missionaries. The same goes for Sarah, the captive missionary. Honestly, John, is rescuing her really worth all this trouble?
Other action heroes at least have witty comebacks and clever lines that entertain you and endear them to you. Rambo’s a mirthless killing machine here, and while that may be the point, it doesn’t exactly make for riveting, edge-of-your-seat entertainment either.
Besides that, the guy’s invincible really. Partly, it’s conditioning from watching way too many action flicks growing up, but I was never once worried about Rambo or felt that he was out of his league. The obstacles he has to overcome just don’t seem that daunting really. Somewhere along the line, you need to up the stakes a bit. While I’m not a big fan of last summer’s Live Free Or Die Hard, at least Bruce Willis found himself pitted against a worthy adversary (although again, no Hans Gruber).
Aside from the incredibly graphic detail of the violence, the action itself is unoriginal and uninspired - we’ve seen it all before, only with less blood. There’s nothing new here.
(The movie is ultra violent. Limbs are blown off, heads are chopped off, and the bullets fly. Honestly, I’m surprised the movie got an R rating.)
The movie’s runtime is pretty short: one hour and 33 minutes, and that’s including the credits. The whole thing feels sort of like the pilot episode for a brand new Rambo And The Mercenaries series for the USA network. Now, Sylvester Stallone has said in interviews that Rambo was not written to be the final film in the franchise, and that if the movie’s performance at the box office warranted it, he wouldn’t mind revisiting the character of John Rambo at a later date. Still, after twenty years, I’d think fans of the series would be expecting a bit more than just another by-the-numbers episode in the action-hero life of John Rambo.
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If you were to pit the two movies against each other, Rocky Balboa would come out on top, no question. Rocky Balboa is a better film and a worthy sequel. Rambo, unfortunately, is not.
Tags: Rambo, Rambo Movie Review, Rocky Balboa
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