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Johann
02-03-2008, 10:10 AM
If you're pushed....killin's as easy as breathin'
-John J. Rambo




Stallone's Rambo is a masterpiece of action.
It's got a consciousness that's extremely hard to ignore.
This film points out the very serious and sick issue of Burma and by the end, John J. has come full circle even if the rest of the world hasn't.

In this fourth film, Rambo is a blacksmith/cobra wrangler in the jungle and he seems to be the only one who knows the way around the area.
Some bleeding-hearts want a lift by boat up the river but they're in way over their heads. He tells them repeatedly: GO HOME.
They don't listen. He takes them only because he respects a woman in the group. But they run into some Burmese Pirates and that's when the film just rockets into a kick-ass, hard-line reality of war.
When Rambo grabs that fucking guy by the neck and rams him into the fucking wood beam- forget about it.
He killed each of those pirates lightning fast, like a super-soldier would. I was just sitting in my seat numb. Stallone is incredible in this film. He openly admits he takes steroids, but that's OK by me-look at his physical presence!
He commands respect in every scene and I loved the scene with the SAS wanker who keeps complaining. He calls Rambo "the Boatman" and he soon learns just who exactly his escort is. All those guys who caught a lift with him got what they deserved.

There are some scenes in this movie that are too much to stomach. See the slow-motion slaughters.
I think Stallone is telling everybody to go home.
The Americans, the dictators, the civilians or missionaries who think they're saving the world: All of you: FUCKING GO HOME. Even John goes home at the end: check that mailbox- R.Rambo

War is stupid, people are stupid.

There's a brilliant flashback sequence where Rambo's dreaming (or having a nightmare) that uses clips and edits from the previous Rambo films. It gives the whole picture a scope of character that really ties it all up.

Thank you Mr. Stallone.
You made a film that really matters.

oscar jubis
02-04-2008, 01:37 PM
Rambo's Politics

Excerpt from J. Hoberman's politically-sensitive review of Rambo (http://www.villagevoice.com/film/0805,hoberman,78960,20.html). Comments anyone?:

Stallone may have recently entertained a Time interviewer by quoting an obscure bit of 1968 acid rock as his source of inspiration, but it hardly seems coincidental that as part of Rambo's eve-of-release PR blitz, the star used a Fox News morning show to make a political endorsement: "There's something about matching the character with the script," he explained. "And right now, the script that's being written—and reality—is pretty brutal and pretty hard-edged, like a rough action film, and you need somebody who's been in that to deal with it": Who else but Senator John McCain? (To complete the love fest, as well as the script, McCain has taken to using the Rocky theme as entrance music.)

Hooray for Hollywood: Brian De Palma is hardly the only old New Lefty equating Iraq with Vietnam. But Redacted is "Vietnam: The Bummer." Rambo is something else. Stallone knows that if the Republicans nominate action-hero McCain, Vietnam will return—with bells on. And, back on the national agenda, the war will have to be won again. (All the more if John-bo runs against Hillary: While he was rotting in a tiger cage, she was out waving a Vietcong flag.)

As the current obsession with Reagan suggests, it's back to fantasyland! The Democrats can consider themselves lucky Arnold Schwarzenegger was born in the Austrian zone of the former Third Reich. Meanwhile, McCain rival Mike Huckabee has cast his suitably bargain-basement Reagan-era muscleman as the embodiment of homeland security: "My plan to secure the border? Two words: Chuck Norris." But as McCain's been suggesting, his guy could kick that has-been's butt—and anyway, homeland security begins over there.

Johann
02-04-2008, 03:21 PM
I hate this whole "Reagan is back" shit.
McCain doesn't belong anywhere near politics.
This Hilary vs. Obama match is boring the hell out of me.
Rudy was/is a joke. Good riddance to him.

You can read whatever you want into this new Rambo film.
To me it's a furnace blast of closure on a classic cinematic character. (With powerful relevance to today's world climate)

oscar jubis
02-07-2008, 01:16 AM
Originally posted by Johann
You can read whatever you want into this new Rambo film.
I heard today, on N.P.R., a Burmese dissident living in Singapore being interviewed. He said several special screenings of Rambo were held for the Burmese community in Singapore. They have been inspired by the film to continue the fight against the military dictatorship. In Burma, the film has been banned, of course. He said that bootleg dvd copies of Rambo are selling like crazy in Rangoon and other cities.

Chris Knipp
02-07-2008, 01:34 AM
The David Edelstein New York Magazine movie column (http://nymag.com/movies/reviews/43335/) I cited in connection with Heath Ledger also deals with The Witnesses but it's lead section is on the new Rambo. One aside: "(his impossible-to-please father thought his physique in the first Rocky looked puny—and did he show Dad)."
If bringing back Rocky and Rambo opens him up to more ridicule from the likes of me, it’s also the kind of challenge at which he excels. Idiotic as Rocky Balboa was, the punches landed, and Rambo works on its own debased terms, too. The arrows hit their targets. The bullets connect. The knives find their viscera. The grenades produce showers of pinwheeling limbs. You’ve never seen gore like this in a mainstream movie—in any movie. CGI has made it possible for machine guns to open heads like pomegranates and split bodies in two where they stand.

The 61-year-old Stallone would deserve a measure of respect for pulling Rambo off, appalling as it is, but this Fangoria-worthy circus of horrors also features footage of actual Burmese atrocities. He wants to get real with it. He just endorsed John McCain, too, probably because McCain was a prisoner of war in Vietnam and Rambo rescued prisoners of war in Vietnam and it’s the least one warrior can do for another. Stallone, of course, sat out the Vietnam War, opting to hang with rich girls in Switzerland. For all his heroic posturing, that’s where he really lives and what he really does, and what he does is what he is. Then, on to Techine. . .

McCain is no joke, guys. He's the Republican with the best chance of winning--and the most integrity.

I haven't seen the new Rambo. I never saw Rocky. I'm ill prepared. I haven't seen any of Stallone's movies. But I like the stenciled-looking posters for the film; they're minimal and elegant.

Johann
02-09-2008, 05:14 PM
Go see RAMBO Chris.

I think you'll find something to admire in it.
I've seen it 5 times now and I've got plans to see it again next week.
It's incredible filmmaking.
Nobody can say Stallone can't direct.
I love the man.

Chris Knipp
02-09-2008, 08:22 PM
If I get a chance.