RAMBO

With great trepidation I went to see a sequel. I was terribly afraid of wasting my money on another worthless sequel. Most movie sequels are a waste of time and the ticket price. They are nothing more than a way to garner money from uneducated, unsuspecting moviegoers who have no clue that the sequel is low-budget, poorly-scripted, and created for the sole purpose to make money and to bilk the public out of their hard-earned cash. So I went to see Rambo wondering into what I’d gotten myself!

Now, to be honest, I very much enjoyed the first Rambo movie. It was well written, about a disgruntled Viet Nam Vet, which was fairly filmed; and although it had a somewhat hokey ending, it had meaning. As a veteran from the Viet Nam era, I could relate!

Rambo II and III sucked out loud; they were typical shit-ass sequels full of stupid themes and hokey one-line sayings not to mention poor writing and acting, and a story line that was just too ridiculous to believe. So, I went to this Rambo with several grave reservations. First of all it was a sequel’s sequel. Secondly, it involved a movie star in his early 60’s (albeit my age), and third, would it be “current”? As someone in his early 60’s I could relate to the physicality of the move if one kept in good shape, which made Sylvester Stallone’s character believable to me .

I was pleasantly surprised! This one is actually GOOD! Let me qualify what I just said. It’s as good as an action flick can be. It only had one hokey saying in it ("Live for nothing, die for something"...I was like “SPARE ME”!). The acting was good, the action was excellent, and you know what surprised me more than anything? It had an amazing score. Not just an action film score, but the kind of score you'd find with Lord of the Rings. It caught my ear after about the first ten minutes of the movie. I was amazed. I actually sat through all the credits to hear the rest of the score. In any case, I say again, this was a good action movie.

The simple synopsis is that John Rambo is living in Northern Thailand. In Burma, there is a civil war that has been going on for 60 years. Missionaries come to Rambo to ask if he’ll take them up-river to help the people of Burma, specifically, the Karen Tribe. The land route has been closed off because of extensive mining. Sarah (played by Julie Benz), one of the missionaries convinces him to take them. She gets a taste of what’s ahead when a Burmese river pirate ship attacks their boat, and Rambo is forced to kill all the pirates. Two weeks later, a pastor Arthur Marsh, finds Rambo and tells him the aid workers did not return and the various embassies have not helped locate them. He’s mortgaged his home and raised money from his congregation to save them. Rambo is hesitant, but given his past, and knowing what he must do, he agrees to take a mercenary force into Burma to rescue the missionaries.

This is an action movie, so one would expect lots of shooting and killing and a not-great script. However, it does have its “human” elements: an introspective John Rambo; a group of missionaries who believe that any killing is abhorrent (an interesting perspective when one of them is forced, in the end, to kill someone to save his friend), and an indictment on the killing that has gone on in Burma for so many years. The scenes are graphic and very well done, while being gruesome. The final 30 minutes of the move had me sitting on the edge of my seat (having experienced some of the particulars of combat), while the combat scenes were very realistic.

I have to say this: while the ending could have been very hokey (I won’t reveal the ending), it was very well done. I found myself reaching for a hankie at the end. Sit at least half-way through the credits just to hear the amazing score done by Brian Taylor and the amazing long-shot of the ending.