Rambo by Gabz (Grzegorz Domaradzki)

"Wide left... Hit."

Included within Lions Gate's Region 1 Ultimate Edition DVD of Rambo III is a suite of deleted footage. The junked clips are mostly uninteresting, with the exception of this short sequence. A fleeing Rambo snipes pursuing Soviet regulars while his ex-handler Colonel Trautman feeds instruction. This single scene captures Rambo's Golem like relationship to Trautman better than any other outside First Blood. From an early string of near misses, John's natural murder aptitude kicks in, enabling him to mechanically pick off the Russian squad. Trautman is delighted. Although unfinished, the way this extract is ordered implies that Rambo is quite happy to burn through remainder ammo assaulting corpses. Hit!

Happy Disaster Year 2009! Ring In The Change With Sega 16-Bit Blips and Blops!

Rambo fears not Hind Helicopter bosses!

Disaster Year: 2008 Awards - Most Exciting Use Of A Decaying 80s Cultural Icon: Rambo

Most Exciting Use Of A Decaying 80s Cultural Icon: Rambo

Sylvester Stallone is so bulging and massive in this year's Rambo he reminded me of Frankenstein's Monster, or a Jason Vorhees bogeyman figure. He's a nightmare. Pumped full of HGH steroids, Stallone is a towering mass of vein bursting hyper-muscles. The lumbering frame and mountain-man gait is a world away from Stallone's last appearance as the titular Green Beret, there he was weepy eyes and steely sinew. Cajoled out of his stomp slumber by a pretty / dull missionary, Stallone ends the film rending his way through the entire Burmese army with an anti-aircraft gun.

Most critical appraisals of the film seem to be undecided about whether it's exploitative for featuring a real conflict zone complete with gore-gag grue; or that it's anti-exploitative for showing the pulverising realities of modern conflict. I suppose it's unfortunate (as far as the issue goes) that it's tied to an 80s style one-man army narrative, with Stallone winning the day. Although, would anyone want to 'be' what Stallone is in Rambo?

Rambo III

Messianic marine mumbler ditches existential monk masonry to rescue his vaguely camp superior from a Hind piloting Russian general, currently Rommeling his way across Afghanistan.

Rambo III raises a vague subtext about Americans making right on proxy wars (most obviously John's de-facto birthplace: Vietnam) by involving themselves with the underdogs resisting techno-might invasion - it's only really flirted with at best though. John allies himself to the local Mujahideen with a charming Pakistani guide and a capering child-soldier in tow. After an apocalyptically disastrous first rescue attempt, Rambo mutilates and scorches his skinny body back to health, locking his mind into a histrionic kill mode. Ally abandoning one-man army thuds follow including some pornographic objectification of a gadget-strewn stab-knife that coloured the BBFC worried.

Despite the bizarrely earnest (and now ironic) set-up, for most of its running time, Rambo III only really collapses when Stallone attempts Schwarzenegger style levity. Stallone's less cartoonish, brutalised frame and darker internalised demeanor are much better suited to the silent pitiless killing machine seen in Rambo - the fourth entry in the series. Increasingly absurd but unsatisfying third act confrontations finally hit peak with a speeding chicken duel between a flying annihilation wasp and a zippy Rambo piloted tank. Naturally Rambo shrugs off the mega-ton wreckage.