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The answer is yes, and it's painted in glorious clots of deep, deep red. When a group of goody-two-shoes religious types get caught up in the middle of Burma's brutal civil war, a reluctant reverend (Ken Howard) seeks out soldier-turned-snake wrangler John Rambo for help. Seems he wants to send some paid 'professionals' in to retrieve his flock, and since our hero guided the original tour into enemy territory, he's the best man to lead this latest incursion. Of course, when the hired help proves woefully egotistical, Rambo steps up to show them the proper way to kick bad guy butt. Besides, he has been 'spiritually' touched by the sole female member, an idealist named Sarah (Julie Benz). He must then break into a heavily-guarded compound and save her and her friends before a corrupt local General throws them to his collection of flesh-eating pigs, among other inhuman tortures.
Make no mistake about it, this is the real 'gorno.' This is SCTV's Billy Sol Hurok and Big Jim McBob's wettest of dreams. Things blow up in Rambo. They blow up real good. Stallone has taken the forgotten skill of human detonation and turned it into an art form.
There is really nothing else about Rambo that's particularly memorable. The mission is pointless and Burma could be any nameless Asian hellhole where evil vanquishes good in a rainswept hail of bullets. But thanks to the gallons of red goo, the bountiful barrels of blood, what should be dull turns slyly diabolical. You can just imagine our steroided 61-year-old sitting behind the camera, his surgery-tweaked face smiling from ear to ear as a massive machine gun literally cuts special effects extras in half.
Rambo is a pleasure of the guiltiest, most gratuitous kind. It's the typical heroes and villains formula on human growth hormones, laced with crack. It satisfies one's instinctual Neanderthal bloodlust and busts as many taboos as it embraces. This is a movie that blows big holes in kids during commonplace village raids, where angry goon squads lop limbs off the elderly and rape the ladies -- both before and after they're dead. Rambo, unlike everyone around him, embraces this truth. He's the lunatic fringe voice of reason in a realm where logic left sanity standing at the altar. His response is the most reasoned -- get in there and screw things up.
And that's exactly what this mindless action movie does. It's like XXX substituting evisceration for fornication. None of the supporting characters are memorable, and the plot is merely a setup followed by splatterific payoff. But when you're dealing with a one-dimensional death machine like Rambo, disemboweling, dismemberment, and decapitation are all the depth that's required. Longtime fans may wonder where the tired solider with the wounded soul from David Morrell's First Blood novel disappeared to. Just like the actor playing him, our hero no longer looks or acts like his predecessor. Oddly enough, as long as he covers his tracks in the entrails of his enemies, we could really care less.
A new Complete Collector's Box Set wraps all four Rambo movies into one package, complete with two bonus discs of making-of extras, commentaries, deleted scenes, and more, all wrapped up in a metal, collectable tin. The 2008 Rambo is also available on its own in a special edition, two-disc DVD with loads of its own extras (commentary from Stallone, deleted scenes, and six making-of featurettes), if you don't want all four films.
Rambo say fire good!
