Rambo: Last Blood

 TV, Rambo: Last Blood (2019) film

Films are not one of my more common review topics these days - either I have too much to say about favourites or, more often, practically nothing for the vast majority, especially modern examples. But seeing the final (I assume), instalment in the Rambo series did give me a few thoughts in general and specifically. To give some background I saw the original trilogy twenty years ago and enjoyed the first two quite a lot - the first featured this broken man who snapped and became a kind of Jason Bourne or Batman figure, using all his jungle fighting skills learned in the Vietnam war to protect himself against a hostile civilian society and dealt with the issue of veterans who returned to hatred and fear, coming only years after the conflict ended in the real world. In the book on which it was based I believe the character dies at the end, but that doesn't make good business sense so of course he survived, and the second film had much of its pleasure coming from the fact that in the first John Rambo was reacting, while in the second he's recruited to go in and achieve mission goals so we get to see what he was like in the field rather than a 'domestic' setting. There's some tragedy with his native wife or girlfriend (it's been a while since I saw it), being killed, some great action sequences and though it doesn't have any of the complexity of the first story, it gives you what you want to see: Rambo doing what he does best, and not merely for survival this time.

'Rambo III' was where the series lost any sense of depth or being more than gorily violent Eighties action, with a slim plot about his now-peaceful (if you ignore his stick-fighting to pay his way!), retired from action, man in a foreign country having to go back into the throng to save his former commanding officer, but is really just an excuse to have Stallone kill lots of enemies (the bit where he cauterises a wound that goes right through his side by pulling a rag into it and setting it on fire in the inky blackness of a cave was certainly memorable!), and was the first one where I didn't feel like it was about anything. The fourth instalment came much later, almost twenty years after and once again was really just an excuse for Rambo to kill, even if it was for a good cause (it's always for a good cause), and because Sylvester Stallone was bringing back his two most famous roles, Rocky and Rambo, from a different era, in a time when CGI spectacle had become the norm. I remember one prominent film critic complaining about how he'd met the actor once and Stallone had reportedly said he'd never bring back those characters because that would be stupid, but everyone's allowed to change their mind so I don't criticise him for doing it, I just wish there had been a return to a deeper look at an issue, whether that be the treatment of soldiers by society, the psychological or physical difficulties of trying to readjust to that society, or anything else, rather than merely a nostalgia for 'simpler times' where it was about men standing up and being men, and as much violence as could be gotten away with.

From this fifth film's title I thought two things: one, they would probably kill off Rambo in this one - Stallone's getting on a bit (is he in his seventies?), so it would be questionable how to put him in the kind of situation you'd expect from the Rambo name, and two, that perhaps there would be some kind of circle-closing story as the titles 'First Blood' and 'Last Blood' are so nicely reflective. Of course titles and such like are designed for marketing purposes, so they want you to assume there's going to be something more to this, that's how the business of film works. In reality I found there was something less. I liked the title, I liked the fact that almost forty years after he first played the role, Stallone was back again - I hadn't expected it after the fourth film, as it seemed like it was just a revival to remind us of a character of long ago, not designed to turn him into a modern sequel franchise. I also quite liked the fact that Rambo has found a measure of peace through a surrogate family, his friendly old housekeeper and a daughter in his charge, a nice ranch, a love of horses, it's all quite pleasant, even if you know things aren't going to stay that way.

It's difficult to see how Rambo can get back into the action that made his name, he's clearly not going to go off to war and they'd already done the plot of him being in the right spot to rescue some victims that require his brand of DIY wilderness warfare. Instead, the troubles come from a very different source, a Mexican drugs and prostitution cartel that scoop up unwary young women and cruelly abuse them without compunction - indeed, the main villain, one of two brothers who run this evil crime organisation, practically boasts about how they mean absolutely nothing, over the broken body and face of Rambo after he's gone after his kidnapped surrogate daughter when she's disobeyed his orders not to go to her birth Father, a despicable, angry man who unsurprisingly doesn't want anything to do with her. I can't imagine he'd have been happy for her to be kidnapped, raped and forced into drug dependency, despite his bitter and cruel shattering of any illusions she might have had about why he left her and her Mother, but we never really get to know him other than hearing bad things about him and seeing the utter disregard for his young daughter in the face of his new family. On his side there are hints that he had reasons for his more minor villainy - bitter about his wife's dying of cancer and leaving him with this young girl, not wanting his current family disrupted by the past, but he's also less than sympathetic in the way he treats her and in the fact he claims they held him back and he was merely bored with them. This may be true or it may be that he has so much resentment over what happened that he was nastier to his daughter than he really feels - people will often lash out in that circumstance, whether that be physically or emotionally.

I liked that Rambo didn't actually harm him, or Gizelle, the 'friend' who first leads the daughter into trouble by telling her she's located her Father. He's very threatening to them both as the swiftest means of narrowing down exactly where his daughter is, but both are tragic figures. Perhaps they are evil, but not in the same league as those from the cartel - it's more about sins of omission and bad character than doing actual harm to the girl. I keep calling her 'the girl' or 'the daughter' because I don't actually remember her name! Considering she's basically the second most important character in the story (if you discount the villains), I didn't feel the setup for Rambo's position in life was well explained. Maybe I missed a line of dialogue early on, but I didn't quite understand how he came to be in that position - I thought it was said she was the daughter of a friend and now he was looking after her, but Manuel (for some reason I can remember the Dad's name!), was much younger than Rambo and clearly there was no friendship there at any time. Was Rambo a friend of the dead Mother? I didn't recall how he ended up at the end of 'Rambo' (the fourth film - I always thought it was called 'John Rambo' in the same way as the sixth Rocky film was called 'Rocky Balboa,' but it seems it was a title stripped right back to basics), and having only seen that once, over a decade ago, I couldn't say if there's any sense of connection to where he ended up there. Probably not, I'd imagine.

The lack of connection with the character and where he came from was a problem for me and one more reason why I didn't connect with this version - he didn't seem to particularly be Rambo other than obviously all the DIY traps and ability to use hit and run tactics in what was essentially a gory, 'adult' version of 'Home Alone' - that was exactly what I was thinking in that last half hour during the assault on his ranch. He sits in his rocking chair on the porch at the end and says something about this being the home where he was born and he'll protect it with his life or something, but I wasn't sure if we were supposed to take this as the specific house where he was born that he'd gone back to (like James Bond in 'Skyfall,' perhaps an inspiration?), or whether he meant America in general, as obviously Rambo was a very patriotic character. But I was disappointed there wasn't any reference to his past, specifically Richard Crenna's commanding officer. I know we see some photos of Rambo as a young soldier, and the big thing is using shots from the previous four films in the closing credits (which also had a nice piece of music - not to the level of 'It's A Long Road,' or the musical theme of 'First Blood' which was echoed briefly in places, but pleasant), to evoke how those films used to end, but he could have been Rocky, he could have been the guy he plays in 'The Expendables,' he just seemed to be Stallone. Maybe I'm judging too harshly, and it's true that I haven't watched the other films for a few years (really need to revisit those first two!), but there seemed more continuity of character in them and I was hoping for a closing of the circle, as I said.

I don't mean we needed CGI Crenna or anything like that, but they could have used his voice and maybe done flashbacks to Vietnam, or something to tie things together. There were one or two scenes where he does gaze into the distance remembering his war experiences, so it's not that the past is never referenced at all, but it's just difficult to connect this guy to the character. I'm sure that would be the case for any long-running character who has been reprised by the original actor in old-age - look at Patrick Stewart for a typical example of how badly it can go, he's a mere shadow of the great Captain Picard to the extent it's hard to watch and believe in him when all his nobility and power is stripped away. I don't know whether it was intentional to show Rambo is out of practice and age has affected his senses or judgement, but the way he just goes in seemingly without a plan to rescue his charge from the cartel was surprising. I know he's angry, but with such a delicate situation and the high stakes, you'd think he'd have been more prepared. I liked his bravery at not submitting to the vast numbers of nasty, weapon-wielding criminals, and he just keeps his head up and faces the villain down, but it did look foolhardy and it was only the villain's own arrogance and cruelty that he got out alive - they leave him battered on the ground so he can live out his life knowing what happened to the girl. In that respect I found the film to be quite a miserable story. I wanted him to get to the girl before it was too late and she was violated and an addict, but even Rambo can't stop the evil, seems to be the message.

It was a bit far-fetched that he could recover in just a few days, too. This journalist who rescues him and gives him sanctuary was an odd addition as she never really went anywhere in the story. I thought it would become some kind of mission to take down the cartel and her testimony would be vital, but before the end when he goes back to her, she just disappears. I assumed she gave him specific knowledge about the place where the brothers lived, or something along those lines, but her contribution wasn't clear at all. It's good that he was able to go back in (a courageous act considering the beating he'd taken the first time), and save the girl, only it was too late, she'd been ruined. Of course it's never really too late, a person can still be salvaged, but she was too far gone and dies on the journey home. I suppose it was a good message for teens about not disobeying parents or guardians because their rulings are there for your protection, but it was a bleak end result, and Rambo's life has basically been ripped apart once again. I understand that this is the motivation for his vicious revenge spree, both at the cartel's place and back on the farm where he goads them into coming after him, but it's still so negative. This was where the film took its turn towards ultimate misery and depression: I know the point of Rambo as he became was to do just that, wreak havoc on an implacably evil enemy of ordinary people, but it's just a sad state of affairs. If it had been more noble, like working with the journalist to take the cartel down somehow, saving his daughter and making all right with the world it could have had an inspiring, vindicating ending, but instead it just comes across as pure, grim bloodthirstiness sating his lust for revenge. But what then?

I found it hard to believe that these cartel bullies would be so well trained that they'd assault the farm like a troop of soldiers, or that on having several of them killed gorily by the various traps and pitfalls, they wouldn't have scattered and run from the place. But that was the Rambo method: a one man army who can take down the opposition with his skills and ingenuity. I liked the idea of a location he's prepared ready to take out an enemy, but it was just a little hard to fully buy. It's odd he built all these tunnels, and never explained. Was it that he always expected to have to fight off a group sometime? I suppose it gives the audience what they wanted, Rambo killing in the most violent way possible, but it was too much. The film also had the impression of being quite small because there weren't many locations and then the farm is the main scene of action, and even the travelling to Mexico and back seems like it's not far away. I don't know, up until the point his daughter died and took away all hope that his life could go on as it had, I quite liked the film, but it was too bleak, too miserable. I'm not sure whether the character should have been killed off or not, to be honest I'm not even sure it matters because what's left is a dead man, if not physically then in every other way. Maybe they were trying to touch on that tragic end from the first film where he's carted away to prison, but there didn't seem to be anything left for him here. He's shot twice by the villain so he could easily have died and the film could even be suggesting he's going to sit on this rocking chair and die now, but I didn't get that from the final scene.

Films have been playing on nostalgia for a long time, bringing characters back, and that still makes money. Would I want a sixth Rambo film? I don't think so because I don't think we really got a proper fifth Rambo film, and even the third and fourth lost what made the first two special. This isn't the kind of film I would rewatch as it really was over the top gore and had little-to-no thematic or inspirational value, it really did seem negative and depressing (much like 'Star Trek: Picard' actually, to return to the Patrick Stewart comparison), and served only to lessen my appreciation of the character and his life rather than put a cap on it - rather like Rambo to the villains, they put a cap in him instead! In the end I'd gone from interested to disappointed to depressed, and I like a good action film, but I also like a hero that means more than killing and has the self-knowledge to learn and grow and Rambo had lived through enough that he should have been in a better place no matter what came against him.

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