Listen, the guy is shirtless and carrying a bazooka on the poster: You know what you’re in for with this one. Cosmatos, who not only later directed Tombstone but is also the father of lunatic Mandy director Panos Cosmatos) essentially drops the whole “sullen vet not appreciated by America upon returning home” idea of the first film and turns Rambo into the Greatest American Hero. The film that really started the whole Rambo mythology, this one (directed by the late George P. The end credits show clips from previous Rambo movies, and they all look like masterpieces compared with this slop. (Or something - it’s harder to make out what he’s saying than usual.) Earlier installments at least had the courage of their ridiculous convictions, but this one just feels stupid and lazy, a desperate stab at propping up an intellectual property long past its prime.
(Their mistake: ensnaring Rambo’s niece, played by Yvette Monreal, in their illicit enterprise.) A fever dream of Trump’s worst vision of our neighbors south of the border, Last Blood is racist when it isn’t pure schlock, as Rambo dispenses with bad guys while occasionally lamenting the darkness of men’s hearts. But Last Blood really feels like Stallone’s attempt to capitalize on Liam Neeson’s particular-set-of-skills aesthetic by pitting his septuagenarian warrior against a group of nasty Mexican criminals who run an underground sex ring. The Rambo of 2008, which brought the moribund franchise back to life, came out before Taken helped popularize a wave of geezer action movies that would later include The Expendables. We’d say this is the final one … but we’ve said that before. Thus: our ranking of all five Rambo films, including the newest installment, Rambo: Last Blood. He ended up acquiescing to a 92-minute cut, and that’s the film that hit theaters - and became such a smash that, 37 years later, we’re getting a fifth Rambo film. So bad, in fact, that, according to the DVD commentary, Stallone offered to buy the film back so no one would ever see it. And to hear Stallone tell it, the film was a disaster. The original cut of First Blood, directed by Ted Kotcheff (who would go on to direct Weekend at Bernie’s!), was more than three hours long. By the sequels, he had transformed into an ultrapumped, flag-waving superhero. Not until a red-hot Stallone approached the project - which Dustin Hoffman was also once attached to - did Rambo become the tortured but valiant veteran.
Steve McQueen was slated to be Rambo and probably would have been had he not been considered too old. The first Rocky film famously made Sylvester Stallone’s career, but it’s worth remembering that his other ongoing franchise, Rambo, was one he initially thought would kill it.īased on a 1972 David Morrell novel - the author, oddly, would go on to write two novelizations of the franchise’s sequels - First Blood was originally supposed to be much darker, with the lead character, John Rambo, being much less sympathetic. Photo: Vulture, Tristar Pictures and Lionsgate