The Cloverfield Monster kills all those 20-something hip douchebags (again) AND half the Burmese Army. Also during the firefight, Rambo grunts and yells.

A lot.




Seriously though, it was the shit. For a hyperviolent movie.

I saw Rambo also....like twenty four years ago....

You're old as dirt.

Anywho, the best thing about it was he wasn't trying to play the Rambo of old, who took on a whole village of VC or the Russians in Afghanistan. This was definitely an older yet craftier John ...didn't hurt that he had help too. The final 20 minutes were fun to watch. If you like bloodspray, headshots and explosions.

Natch.

I'm gonna see it right now. Bye.

Just saw it.

Excellent film. The cinematography was awe-inspiring at times.

The only problem was the lack of an archetype or counterpart for Rambo and I was also hoping it was more quotable. Stallone was talking with Rush Limbaugh on the radio before I left to see the movie and he said something along the lines of, "What they don't understand is that the world is savage and war and death are a way of life. Peace was the accident." That was so bloody righteous I got the impression he was quoting Rambo, but he didn't say it in the movie.

I suppose it was best he remain silent since Rambo served as a spectator of the more extreme opinions. But in lieu of this, I was hoping for a likewise character with a similar history to Rambo who would be more vocal, egotistical, and blood-thirsty than John. He'd be a devil's advocate who was as guerrilla driven as Rambo but more verbal about their mutual feelings about the world and about war. And then Rambo would kill him in a showdown before manning that turret.

But that's me and I'm a romantic.


The movie was splendid with a great story, top-notch camera work, realistic violence, and absolutely oppressive war scenes. The amount of action was more than satisfactory, but I felt it could have had more abstract elements like a character who actually did an analysis of Rambo's mindset. This would have been much more effective in explaining Rambo and his nature rather than just showing quick-as-lightening flashbacks from the past movies. It would have helped a friend of mine who saw it with me since she'd never actually seen the previous movies.

What I liked most of all was he appeared more effective as a sparsely equipped survivalist than those mercs. Those were some fairly impotent fucks for all their bravado. A bow and arrow is just as deadly and lot more quiet if you don't want to let the Burmese know you're walking through.

fyi.

Isn't "Fuck the world" enough of a quote?

It's a renter.

I forgot to mention how epic it was when he sent that arrow through the back of that guy's head and out of his face.

I was confused about the Claymore though. Just to be clear: He did leave C4 next to the trap yes? 'Cuz a claymore wouldn't be able to cause that much damage all on its lonesome.

The Japanese dude had the C4, School Boy the claymore. No way he had nothing but.
In Suspension of Disbelief Mode, I figured the dud had enough juice in it to be triggered by a secondary explosion, the claymore.

C4 could probably be detonated by a nearby claymore. But in any case... this movie is actually worth seeing? Seriously? 'Cause the trailers didn't seem to spectacular.

It's not a think piece, although none of the Rambos ever were.
It does bring one of the longest civil wars in the world to light, but it isn't preachy so much as it is just plain bloody.
This one is tops.

The first guy or second guy? heh

The last dude got it the worse... in the back and out of a socket it appeared.

I think I have your archetype.

I was thinking more along the lines of a more talkative Aaron Hallam.

Frankie Four Fingers?

Uh...N--....Yeah. Frankie Four Fingers.

The Hunted

No, no, no... Dr. Gonzo.
To be honest I never managed to sit through all of "The Hunted."

Okay.

Sorry; I meant I really don't know a whole helluva lot about Del Toro's character in that movie. Coulda been worse, I could've immediately called him Jackie Boy.

waaaaaaait a minute, are you guys actually saying this movie is worth seeing?

probably not even that for me. The first was one of my favorite movies. This looks shitty. Besides I read the script online and it sucked. Plus it's clear that they don't understand who Rambo really is and they sure as hell don't understand his mission.

Damn P. I didn't realize you were such a big fan of the Burmese.



Yes.

This movie is the biggest piece of shit ever made.

You know I don't give a shit about the Burmese and that I have no problems with America's military being used to the fullest extent. Your talking to a guy who would go nuclear if he could. Don't make it about anything other than this is a really shitty movie that should never have been made.

P, there is no need for denial. I'm not gonna judge you just because you love the Burmese. I'm sure you have a good reason.

This is the worst movie ever.

It's like I'm some big dumb loudmouthed know it all who always posts in the Batman Begins and Dark Knight movie threads who complains about a movie they've never seen!


But they read the script!

There were at least three or four non-stop, several minute long, body parts exploding in every frame battle sequences, and that didn't even include the hilarious flashback/recap of the previous movies thing they had goin' on in the middle. It was glorious. The pacing was about as well-suited to the material as it could have been.

I honestly couldn't tell you what the movie was about or who was involved. I'm struggling to remember the other characters in the film, or the, y'know, plot. Still, very effective action.

Oh, and afterwards I snuck into Cloverfield and I thought it kinda sucked. Oh well.

Author David Morrell, Rambo's creator, just updated his official webpage with a review of Rambo: http://davidmorrell.net/whatsnew/dsp.whatsnew.cfm

RAMBO

Many of you contacted me to ask what I think of the fourth RAMBO movie. I'm happy to report that overall I’m pleased. The level of violence might not be for everyone, but it has a serious intent.



This is the first time that the tone of my novel FIRST BLOOD has been used in any of the movies. It's spot-on in terms of how I imagined the character—angry, burned-out, and filled with self-disgust because Rambo hates what he is and yet knows it's the only thing he does well. The character spends a lot of time in the rain as if trying to cleanse his soul. There's a nightmare scene involving vivid images from the three previous films (they indicate the emotional burden he carries). There's a scene in which Rambo forges a knife and talks to himself, basically admitting that he hates himself because all he knows is how to kill. At the start, Rambo is gathering cobras in the jungle, and he's so comfortable with them, it's as if, because of his past, the most developed part of him is his limbic brain. He has nothing to fear from another creature of death. In the cathartic violence of the climax, he uses a machine gun that evokes the way wounded William Holden uses a machine gun at the end of THE WILD BUNCH (one of my favorite films). Indeed much of RAMBO has Peckinpah overtones while it also uses tropes from the novel (again, for example, there's an exciting sequence in which Rambo is hunted by dogs).



Another excellent element involves the film's archetypal, mythic overtones. Rambo is hardly ever called by his last name. Instead, he keeps being referred to as "the Boatman" because he earns his living with a boat on a river in Thailand. But after he's called "the Boatman" enough, I start thinking of the River Styx and the journey of death as depicted in Greek myth. Similarly, the knife-forging sequence reminds me of Hephaestus, the armorer of the Greek gods (in the sequence, Rambo even talks about whether God can forgive him for what he's done). Sly is definitely sophisticated enough to embed these sorts of allusions. The earlier Rambo movies were a combination of a Tarzan movie and a western. That is also the case here. The knife (again designed by master blade-maker Gil Hibben), the bow and arrow, Rambo racing through the jungle—these scenes are primal and breath-taking.



Some of you sent me emails, suggesting that maybe a younger actor would have been better for the fourth movie. But it’s important to remember that Rambo (unlike James Bond) is specific to a historical period: the Vietnam War. My novel FIRST BLOOD was published in 1972. If Rambo were a real person, he would have been perhaps 22 at the time. In 2008, he would be 58. Sylvester Stallone is a few years older than that, but basically he is the correct age, and in the new movie, he interprets the character in an older way. That's one reason he put on the weight—so he would look different from the trim muscular image he had in the 1980s Rambo movies.


Some elements could have been done better. The villains are superficial, to say the least. A lot could have been done with the connection between drug lords and the military in what the film calls Burma, dramatizing that money earned from the heroin trade motivates their brutality. Instead, they’re merely depicted as psychopaths. In a baffling moment, heroin somehow gets equated with meth, which is something entirely different and has nothing to do with the poppies grown in that area of the world.



Otherwise, I think this film deserves a solid three stars. Even the NEW YORK TIMES treated it well, emphasizing the way the character is given depth. Rambo is no longer the jingoistic character of the second and third films. The most telling line of dialogue is, “I didn’t kill for my country. I killed for myself. And for that, I don’t believe God can forgive me.” While that statement is in keeping with my novel FIRST BLOOD, it’s jaw-dropping when compared with the dialogue in the second and third Rambo films.



Some posters list me as an associate producer. This is an error. I was not involved with the production, and this time around, I didn’t write a novelization for the movie. But I do receive two credits. One is a single card "created by" credit before the names of the screenwriters. At the end, after the final surprising, poetic, redeeming sequence, another credit says "From the novel FIRST BLOOD by David Morrell." Two credits aren’t the way Hollywood usually treats a novelist. The second reference seems to acknowledge that the series has returned to the tone of the original novel. To say again, the violence is a solid R, but the intent is serious. I was blown away.

I'M BOATMAN!

No you're not. I am. And you know nothing of my work.