MovieChat Forums > Rambo III (1988) Discussion > Kinda pointless

Kinda pointless

posted 3 years ago by Drooch (5333)
20 replies | jump to latest

Part II turned Rambo into an action series and went all out, with a great script by James Cameron that was packed with inventive kills and was brilliantly paced, the film clocking in at 90mins with not a moment wasted.

III just feels weak-sauce. The pacing is sluggish for the first half, the kid is unwelcome, the desert is not an environment that lends itself to elaborate kills - which are very bland for the most part. Also the villain is a crap version of Berkoff’s vastly superior Russian sadist from II.

What I did like was the idea of Trautman needing rescuing. Crenna is fantastic in the role and his buddy-cop relationship with Rambo was nice. It was also cool to have a proper big-bad-guy fight with that Russian bear, who has a spectacular death (although it made no sense that he instantly released Rambo once he pulled the grenade pins out - why not hold onto the guy and take him out with you..?)

The opening stick fight was cool, and Stallone was in peak condition, he looked great in the role.

So yeah, I just felt this film was pointless. Not terrible, but bland and a step backwards from Part II. I don’t get why they didn’t try to up the ante.

Rambo IV, however, was a great return to the character. Cranking up the violence to gorno levels, getting straight into the story, and grounding the film in very credible Burmese war crimes. I love how the peace-loving Christian missionaries don’t listen to Rambo and instantly get captured, raped and killed, and the survivors turn into bloodthirsty killers - there’s a serious message about respecting the evil out there.

Contrary to many old-school Rambo fans, I really like Last Blood. Even more brutality and the Stallone-Alone conceit was a refreshingly different take. There’s also something about latter-day Stallone that is amazing - he has enormous gravitas and presence, and he’s brutishly ugly, just a smouldering beast that you really don’t want to poke with a stick. The hell he unleashes on the Mexican scumbags at the end is glorious.

[–] millsey72 (10601) 3 years ago

I don't like this movie because Rambo teams up with the Taliban to take out the Russians

[–] Drooch (5333) 3 years ago

Meh, Bond does the same in The Living Daylights and that film is awesome.

[–] seagal72 (1991) 3 years ago

Whilst I agree with your assessment (especially Part II, which is the blueprint for all subsequent action movies that followed)......I have to say, despite enjoying 'Last Blood' as a great Stallone movie....it was (in retrospect) a lousy 'Rambo' movie. It felt akin to retitling 'Bullet To The Head' as 'Rocky VII' (and citing it as ""Refreshingly Different")

It just wasn't Rambo....He should have left the franchise, at the fourth (majestic) installment.

[–] Drooch (5333) 3 years ago

The character is in his 70’s, he’s an old codger who lives with some family, he’s past his tank and helicopter days, soldiers get old. I bought that he’d be more chill as a pensioner, but when they fuck with his family the beast gets let out of the cage once more for the ultimate ‘get off my lawn’ bloodbath.

My only issue was when Rambo follows them into the dangerous favelas and allows himself to get surrounded. Pretty basic tactical error! Also, it’s weird how the film forgets about Gabriela’s scumbag father. That guy needed a good beating.

I quickly forget about all that once the villains enter the tunnels, and Rambo unleashes more violent, inventive deaths than the rest of the series combined. Gunishment has never been so glorious 🍿

[–] avortac4 (3752) 3 years ago

Yeh, Hot Shots 2 was a much better 'Rambo III' than this, dry crap.

It's like 'First Blood' wasn't really even a 'Rambo-movie', although everyone calls it Rambo or Rambo 1 for some reason. I don't really like these 'murderers are great'-type movies, but an action flick is sometimes brain-nulling to watch, so this type of romp serves a purpose.

That movie is of course as stupid as it is unrealistic, and the horrible, wimpy crybaby ending ruins it completely. Why are these war macho viewers so quick to praise crying like a girl all of the sudden? What wusses!

I mean, to list just some logical stupidities this so-praised character does in the movie:

1) He doesn't WAIT until the cop is out of sight to walk back in town and grab a bite to eat. WHAT does he expect to happen, defying without being ready to fistfight the sheriff? What is his plan? It makes no sense from any possible angle.

If you read the trashy, horribly filled with cusswords-type cheap hospital waiting room novel, even there, he has more brains, and has been in and out of towns like that a lot, and always walks back after the sheriff is not looking, and can spend many days until the sheriff finds him again, and runs him out of town. Heck, he even does some fishing and stuff, he's not in a hurry to confront the sheriff and go to jail in the book.

2) He resists arrest, as if he wouldn't know what THAT causes, instead of trying to communicate. He doesn't even plead, he just stubbornly and defyingly asks stupid questions, instead of just saying things like "I am sorry, sheriff,. I am really hungry, could I at least eat something before I leave? That's a long walk, you know.", or something?

3) This is the absolute kicker that a dumb hick redneck teenager first-time-on-a-motorbike moron wouldn't even do; he tries to ride the bike 50 degrees uphill and then leaves the bike when it OBVIOUSLY can't climb that steeply..

.. instead of.. well, let's check what options Rambo has.

[–] avortac4 (3752) 3 years ago

The sheriff's car is upside down in a faraway ditch. Rambo could LEISURELY drive back, find some forest path NO CAR CAN FOLLOW (like he should've done in the first place - or he could've turned 180 degrees and gone to the opposite direction to gain some distance - a car is not gonna turn around as quickly, especially in some uphill in a field or whatever), between trees and such.

He could've even driven back to roads, and then taken all kinds of turns, and no one would've found him (at least for ages).

4) After the 'cave scene' when everyone thinks he's dead, and he should realize this is the case, he could've just walked away, continued his journey, found shelter in some other town or whatever, and no one would have found him until that 'gas station scene' that Trautman depicted. HE COULD HAVE WALKED AWAY SO EASILY at that point.

But our 'brave hero' chooses to start messing around with them and shooting innocent people's city, destroying some infrastructure, exploding buildings and thus destroying working careers of multiple people, possible even killing many (the people in the cop car car that exploded were surely killed).

So 'First Blood', although praised as a great movie, is really a very minuscule event that wouldn't really make any difference in this planet's history, it doesn't bring the viewer to fantastic escapism, it's just a dull 'chase drama' with so much stupidity and unrealism and Trautman's 'macho BS' that it's amazing anyone is able to stomach it. And then stallone weeping and crying like an idiot girl at the end. Groan.

(There's more stupidity, but I don't want to write about that movie for 800 pages)

Rambo: First Blood Part II, that some people call 'Rambo II' or even 'Rambo 2' for some reason (I will never understand people), takes the corpse of this pretty dead (at least brainwise) movie and tries to breathe new life to it by making it into a 'let's explode everything'-cartoon.

[–] avortac4 (3752) 3 years ago

Did anyone (besides Weird Al Yankovic) not notice how stupid it looks when Stallone screams, then presses a button and then something IMMEDIATELY explodes. No smoke trails, no missiles flying, no targeting required, nothing. Just press-KABOOM!!!

EVERY single time. Every. Single. Time.

There's no 'flying arrow' arc shown, there's no 'fire trail' or anything, just press or shoot or release something and IMMEDIATE BOOM!

Ok, when he explodes the guy that has the worst aim in the history of movies, there's at least some unrealistic sound before the explosion, but geez. Also, you don't AIM your bow for that long! That's not how bows work.

In any case, the cartoon is 'entertaining' and typically war-movie-hilarious, but I wish they had left the original 'Noooooo!' in, it would've been even funnier. The movie also cheats so much with 'movie magic', you have to wonder how stupid the audience is supposed to be. The helicopter scenes especially, holy cow.

Also, how does ONE CANISTER create a MASSIVE MULTI-LOCATION, MULTI-LEVEL FUEL EXPLOSION?!

HOW?

Almost every time an angle changes, we're shown something different than previously - Rambo ABSOLUTELY shouldn't have been able to reach the helicopter, but ANGLE CHANGE makes it possible. That's cheating!

Why are we applauding a hero that murders innocent animals and destroys innocent people's villages who have done nothing wrong, like it's nothing? "How clever to use the chicken blood" said NO CHICKEN EVER!

The whole weird, convoluted plot (why hire RAMBO for this kind of mission that involves taking photos? What? WHY?) that makes no sense, and the 'patriotic speech at the end' - I guess Stallone thought anything goes because Rocky IV also had a similar speech - it's just so hilariously cartoonish, that it's obvious this movie only exists because of money. It doesn't tell anything poignant, it doesn't point out anything we don't know already, it's just BOOM BOOM MURDER CHICKENS BOOM and speech.

[–] avortac4 (3752) 3 years ago

I have seen that cartoon movie so many times, and I still don't quite understand how the story is supposed to make sense.

The 'evil people' know 'our own men' are still POWs in Vietnam somewhere, except for some reason, Russians are involved, and Russians are 100% evil in the eighties.

The families of the POWs are putting pressure on the american goverment, so good ol' USA goes to Vietnam, establishes a base without air conditioning in the jungle, just so they can fly helicopters to 'enemy camps' (although Vietnam is no longer supposed to be the enemy), so some brave photographer can land and take photos of empty camps to prove they're empty, so then the families will shut up.

Did I get this right so far?

(As hare-brained as it already is)

Like, why can't they just FAKE those photos, if it's really all about photos? Why tell Rambo to photo camps that AREN'T empty? Surely they should know whether the camps are empty or not. Why hire an unstable maniac from prison instead of someone stable, stealthy and 'sound'? (Think of what Rambo did in the first movie, would you hire him for a photo mission? HIM?? OF ALL POSSIBILITIES?! A shell-shocked specialist with huge muscles!)

Why would they think the families would shut up after seeing a photos the families would probably at least SUSPECT to be faked even if they were real? What would photos prove anyway? I mean, timing taking the photos so the camps ARE empty, etc..

I don't know, it's just so hard to figure out how ANYONE (the chracters OR the writers) thought any of it would make any sense.

In any case, the second movie is a cash-cow because the first movie, as bad and stupid as it is, made money.

Now they wanted to make 'Rambo' into a franchise? A shell-shocked maniac with massive muscles and no qualms to blow up a town in the first movie, turns to be a cartoon 'hero' that explodes people's villages up because he's the good guy somehow, so in the third movie, what should he be?

[–] avortac4 (3752) 3 years ago

I mean, the book's rambo was possibly even crazier, but still.

Rambo is not like Rocky, who is still kind of an idiot for willingly taking so many powerful punches to his head, but who can still be sympathetic 'hero' as the main character, because he starts off as poor and living in a ghetto, and slowly works his way up to fame, fortune and a big mansion and luxury cars. Rocky has a clear progression from a bum to a successful celebrity, but where can Rambo go?

He's a shell-shocked warmonger, trained to murder, kill and survive in difficult situations. In first movie, he blows up a town and endangers innocent people, in second movie, he murders animals, blows up villages of innocent people and kills many people, who were just doing their job. I mean, why is guarding a village a crime that earns an arrow through your brain?

How do you make this into an 'underdog' story, where Rambo becomes some kind of successful good guy? No matter what you do with the character, he's still going to be an unstable maniac that's capable of murdering without second though and exploding people's villages without provocation. He's a failed character, failed hero, so all you can do is.. send him to war?

I always hated deserts anyway, and those places are very 'unnatural and hostile', if you compare them to a lush forest, for example. I mean, there's not much nature in a desert. it's uncomfortable, hot, sandy, dry, survival is most difficult. In a forest, you have more possibilities, beautiful nature, different sceneries and such. Desert is just boring, it's just dry, hot sand and some rock formations.

You can't use desert as just a backgrop, because desert adds another hostile enemy to the list; you have to somehow survive in the desert, as it IS a hostile environment, instead of neutral. I wonder if Stallone felt too cold in the mountains, showing his muscles throughout the movie, so he wanted a warmer climate to do it in.

Third movie is like running in place, a rehash.

[–] avortac4 (3752) 3 years ago

The third movie even has an illogical name, suddenly it's no longer First Blood Part III: Rambo Goes Wild or something, but it's Rambo III... what kind of sense does this make? First movie was NOT called 'Rambo' - try finding that word anywhere in the actual title card of the movie!

The second movie was still FIRST BLOOD-movie, not a RAMBO-movie - Rambo was just a subtitle, after the movie's name was established to be 'First Blood Part II'!

How the hell do you go from that to 'Rambo III'? There was never Rambo I or Rambo II, for crying out loud.

To add, 'First Blood' doesn't even make sense in the second movie, as there's no 'first blood' scene, as in the first movie, even though Rambo himself DID draw the first blood out of someone's nose in the first movie.

So nothing makes sense, but it's like they're not even trying with this one.

The second movie's story didn't make any sense, so I guess they tried to simplify it into a 'simple rescue story', but that doesn't really work. The first movie at least tried to be poignant about shell-shocked Vietnam murderers, but what message did the later movies give us besides "War, it's fantastic!"?

Trautman is a great character, but not when he's in a position of weakness. He should always be the strong backbone of the movie, like he was in the first one.

Whatever, these movies are pretty dumb in any case, but the third movie REALLY shows just how dumb the Rambo character and these movies are.

[–] moviechatterer (15992) a year ago

"The third movie even has an illogical name"

They had to consolidate the two naming conventions somehow .

[–] moviechatterer (15992) 2 years ago

Contrary to many old-school Rambo fans, I really like Last Blood. Even more brutality and the Stallone-Alone conceit was a refreshingly different take. There’s also something about latter-day Stallone that is amazing - he has enormous gravitas and presence, and he’s brutishly ugly, just a smouldering beast that you really don’t want to poke with a stick. The hell he unleashes on the Mexican scumbags at the end is glorious.

I liked Last Blood too , nice to see Rambo in the civvy environment , out of the warzone - but I thought the last act was too much "Home alone" booby traps and not enough waving the m60 around whilst yelling "aaaaarrrgghh!!!"

[–] Drooch (5333) 2 years ago

I got my fill of that in Ramby 4 when he pulverised an entire army for 10 minutes solid with that 50 cal aircraft gun, I was happy to see him go all stealth and booby traps in 5, especially since they were all brutal and ripped them to pieces. Topped off, of course, with him carving open the main bag guy’s chest, ripping out his still beating heart, showing it to him as he died, and then dumping it on the floor like garbage 👏🏻🍻

[–] moviechatterer (15992) 2 years ago

yeah I got the impression he was tired and wanted a little sit down at that point in 4 , so instead of joining the battle , has a rest in that jeep firing indiscriminately down the hill to the battlefield , I bet his merc friends down there were loving that!
miracle they wernt all friendly-fired

[–] BOandBarbecue (2264) 2 years ago

agrees. the third film just play out like weak rehash of superior rambo II.

very good action in rambo 3, some of the best action of all times, but the characters not so good, much better character and script in rambo 1 & 2. i think maybes stallone have big egos in III so he avoid casting better actor in 3 in case they upstage him?

ps i hear very little of james cameron draft end up as final movie in rambo 2. sly apparent re-write almost all of it.

rambo last bloods > rambo IV

[–] mechajutaro (2788) 2 years ago

Fair inference: The script for Avatar was just the script for RII, given a ski-fi makeover

[–] BOandBarbecue (2264) 2 years ago

please explains.

avatards like dances with wolfes and ferngully. i dont see rambo II hahahah.

[–] Drooch (5333) 2 years ago

Berkoff > Lang

[–] AmericaILoveU (1000) 2 years ago

R1, R2 & R4 are amazing!
Blood was way below expectations and the final battle may too short. It needed another 20 min. 4/10
R3 is the weakest in the series and was made for a quick cash grab.

[–] GetWokeGoBroke (785) a year ago

Rambo III is awesome.