Didn’t you ever wanna tear the crap out of a town for nothing but revenge? John Rambo did. While searching for friends from his old Vietnam unit, Rambo gets derailed by a local hick sheriff who doesn’t like drifters and one thing escalates rapidly into another until Rambo is off in the hills hiding out and sniping the sheriff’s men down one by one.
| "I’ll give you a war you won’t believe…" |
Naturally the army is then called in and Rambo’s old boss, Colonel Trautman appears to quell the fire within his old trainee, but is he too late to stop Rambo’s murderous rampage?
Well, anyone who doesn’t know by now will learn if they view this first film in a box set that includes all three of the Rambo movies. However, we’re here at present to talk about the first of these in First Blood. This is easily the best of the Rambo films and comes direct from the author David Morrell and his novel of the same name. The emotional content of this film is also better than its compatriots, as the audience is cleverly and immediately sided with Rambo and the injustices dealt against him. He’s just a humble guy trying his best to get along after witnessing the horrors of war first hand, and when he returns to an angry America, still licking its wounds after Vietnam, he is treated like a criminal of sorts.
This problem has had attempts to correct it since 1982, when this film was shot, and today isn’t the same issue it was back then. However, the film is still one with a good point to make – and one the follow-ups (read: cash-ins) seemed to tack on rather than fuel the action itself.
First Blood is also the first film of what was to become a million dollar character and one recognised in households the world over today. One does wonder why, as the films aren’t truly stand out affairs, and the only answer I can come up with offhand is that Rambo was the most memorable of the ‘survival’ characters. Being Sylvester Stallone (at the peak of his film career when the sequel came out three years later) sealed the deal for recognition. That’s my thinking on the subject. Whenever anyone seems to use the reference (and admittedly not so much these days) it’s for being tough or surviving a night without mossie coils or something.
At any rate, First Blood is the better of the three films and of course, the best one to begin with if you are just beginning to experience Stallone’s intrinsic and second-most recognised character (or should that read dual-first?).
For a film 22 years old this year (2004), this film looks pretty awesome. Delivered in the full cinema aspect ratio of 2.35:1 with anamorphic enhancement, this is the first time I’ve ever seen this whole film. The last version I saw was a grainy videotape that had passed through God knows how many players before mine and was in 4:3 pan and scan. Here the many deeper shadows of the film are well-delivered giving us clean vision of every moment. Even the night scenes and the interior cave scenes look crisp with only the rarest moments of graininess. The only other fault lies in very, very rare occurrences of blacks turning blue. Still, no biggie there.
A rampaging Dolby Digital 5.1 surround deal works the room here, sending any number of channels and bullets whizzing about our heads. There are plenty of travelling forest sounds too and the subwoofer ably supports the numerous explosions, gunshots, helicopters and all that fun stuff. Some dialogue is a little garbled or run together, but it’s rare and not a real problem for this action movie. The sound effects are mostly okay, save for a couple of stock sound effects that includes one of my all-time favourites; tyre-screech-on-dirt-road. Honestly, are they even watching the vision when the synch it up?
Music is fairly good and scored by the flexible Jerry Goldsmith, renowned for his thrilling action backing music. Here he delves into militaristic with plenty of thriller deep bass piano and dramatic drums. The worst thing about this is the song over the closing credits by Dan Hill (music by Jerry Goldsmith). It’s a Long Road is a pretty bad song and delivered just as badly. So very 1982…
David Morrell’s novel is almost written for the screen and here it gets a pretty good adaptation. The film is a watchable one, even if you’re not big on Stallone or action junkets, where those that come after are pretty much just for the action junkies. Well worth revisiting for those teenage boys who enjoyed it way back when, or for teenage boys of today who want something a little more old school in their bloodbaths. The bodycount is also much, much less in this first well-written film, but I’ll come to that in the reviews for those that follow...
