The Rambo films have always had a modicum of violence. From the brilliant original, First Blood, with John Rambos takedown of the small town of Hope, to the amped up masculinity of First Blood Part II and the utter ridiculousness of Rambo III, Stallone has always attempted to show the violence Rambo endured in Vietnam (even if it was preposterous in the last of the trilogy). After the success of Rocky Balboa, however, the film wasnt the last part of three as Stallone revisited his second most famous creation. Taking place twenty years after Rambo III, we find the title character living in Thailand, hiding from his demons. When he is approached by a missionary group who want to provide aid to the people of Burma, Rambo is forced to confront his demons as he takes the group into deadly territory. When John later hears the group have been captured by a ruthless group of Burmese soldiers, he must accompany a group of mercenaries into the jungle on a rescue mission. On paper (on screen?) this seems like a typical Rambo action film but Stallone wanted to make an old-school eighties action movie. Blood, guts and, well, more blood. The violence in this mainstream cinema movie is amped up to crazy levels, perhaps never more obvious than when Rambo uses a huge machine gun mounted on a jeep to take down an army of Burmese soldiers. Stallone is definitely channelling his eighties action hero vibes here, certainly when he guts the evil leader. Several cinema chains refused to screen the film because of the violence and the film is banned in Burma. It was a big hit though and was one of the biggest selling DVDs of the year. This, perhaps more than anything, shows that these films, like so many in the eighties before it, find their true audience with the home crowds and not the international cinema distributors.
