Reaction & Review | First Blood

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering an action movie from 1982. That movie is "First Blood".

Yeah, guys, shockingly, I have never seen a Rambo movie in it's entirety before. I have seen bits and pieces of one of the movies on TV, but that was years ago. And I've never had a chance to watch these series of movies until now, thanks to me doing this series. So yes, guys, for the next couple of months, I'm gonna be reviewing all 5 of the Rambo movies for this series. And I'm pretty excited to be checking these movies out, because I have heard mostly positive things about this series. So hopefully, they'll be as good as most people claim them to be.

Now, I'm gonna tell you everything I know about the Rambo series right here. I know they all star Sylvester Stallone, and I know that he plays a war veteran by the name of John Rambo. And he's being sent out on dangerous missions by himself to destroy his enemies. Now admittedly, I don't exactly know everything about the plot to most of these movies, outside of a couple of them. However, I will get more into those whenever I eventually get to them.

As for this first movie, I honestly have no idea what to expect here. Like I said, I know about the character Sylvester Stallone plays, but I don't know much else beyond that. I've been trying to avoid as much as I can about spoilers for these movies, because I want to experience them as a new viewer going into them. I'm hoping that this first one is gonna be a great start to this series. But I have no idea if it actually will be. The only way I am gonna find out for sure, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "First Blood".

10 minutes later

I'd like to say right now, guys, that I'm getting real sick of this fucking cop that's been harassing Rambo. I seriously hope something bad happens to this asshat of a cop, because he's REALLY starting to becoming very irritating right now. And hopefully, some kind of karma will happen to him sooner rather than later.

7 minutes later

Well, guys, I can totally say that those cops fucking deserved it. Yeah sure, Rambo was having PTSD flashbacks. But honestly, even without that, I think that was totally justified with him kicking their asses like it's nothing. I think I'm gonna end up really liking this movie, guys. Call it a hunch.

3 minutes later

Well...I will say that was probably the funniest way to deal with that asshole cop. Just have his car tumble over into a ditch while landing on the hood upside down. Kinda wished he would've gotten a more punishing karma, but still, I'll happily take what I can get out of it. Hopefully, it'll be the last we hear of this fucking cop, but we'll just have to wait and see.

10 minutes later

So, even with a bloodied arm, Rambo was still able to take out his first victim. Granted, the idiot with the sniper rifle kinda fell out since it was own fault and all. And it looks he fell on the worst thing possible, too, which obviously caused his death. I'm curious to see how Rambo is gonna survive all this, knowing now that he's probably heavily injured from that big jump he took a moment ago. This should be interesting.

1 minute later

Oh, jeez...guys, I'm thankful I've never been injured in this kind of fashion. And I can't imagine how badly that would fucking hurt just to see Rambo stitching his bloodied arm like that, knowing that it's STILL bleeding as he's doing this. Just...Jesus Christ, that looks painful as hell.

9 minutes later

O...K. And I just got to see one of these cops getting spiked in the crotch area. That's actually more painful than how the cop from earlier died from that fall. At least with him, it was an instant death. But the fact that this cop got his balls spiked like that is infinitely more painful! And yet, despite all that, I still don't feel sorry for these cops in the slightest.

18 minutes later

So they fired a rocket launcher into the mine that Rambo is currently hiding in. Ignoring the fact that they were told to stand down and don't fire, are they not gonna check for a possibility that Rambo probably did manage to go further into the mine where he would have free reign in the darkness? I'm sorry, guys, but if I were the guy in charge of finding Rambo, I would wait until we get actual confirmation before celebrating that they 'got' Rambo. It makes these soldiers look really stupid in hindsight. Just saying.

15 minutes later

Holy shit! Well, guys, I just found the coolest explosion so far, where Rambo just pushed a police car into another random car ahead, causing a pretty cool explosion. That was really awesome.

2 minutes later

Never mind, I found an even BETTER explosion than the one I just saw a moment ago. That one was seriously awesome! It really was.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "First Blood". And that was certainly an ending, I'll say that much. Let me go ahead and shut the movie off...OK. Well, I think it's safe to say that, if this movie is anything to go by, then I'm gonna be in for a really good couple of months here. Because this movie was fucking great. I really enjoyed the hell out of this thing.

So now, I think it's time to get into this review proper by first discussing the writing. Now earlier, I talked about what little I knew about the Rambo series. I knew that he was played by Sylvester Stallone and that he plays a war veteran by the name of John Rambo. I also mentioned that he was being sent out on dangerous solo missions to destroy his enemies. Now admittedly, I don't know how accurate that is for the rest of the movies going forward, but with this first one...I was WAY the fuck off with that statement. Because what we got here was completely different than what I had guessed early on. And I'm kinda happy that I was wrong there. Because my summarization on what I thought it was going to be sounded like a plotless action movie. Now admittedly, this movie's story is rather paper-thin, but I'm gonna tell you, guys, they run with this story so well that you are going to be sucked into this movie the moment that the actual plot kicks off. And at no time does the movie have any pace-breaking moments. The story flows just well enough from it's moments of the cops trying to go after Rambo, to any scenes involving the police chief and Colonel Trautman, and to Rambo just trying to fight off a one man war against the cops that they themselves started. Everything about the pacing of this movie is perfect. And being that this movie is only around 90 minutes long, it had the perfect amount of length to where it was neither too short, nor too long either. So yeah, the pacing of this movie fantastic.

So what is the actual plot? Well, as I already mentioned, Rambo's basically trying survive against these cops that are after him. And how exactly did this all start? Well essentially, Rambo gets picked up by the police chief when he sees Rambo just walking into town by himself. Well, the police chief, whose actual name is Will, basically ends up becoming a dick by telling Rambo that they don't like his kind around here and that the next diner he could eat was about 30 miles away. He drops him off across the other side of the bridge. But Rambo, not being satisfied, decides to walk back across the bridge and into town. Which causes Will to turn his car around and arrest Rambo, because he's that much of an asshole. And later, as they're going through the proceedings of his arrest, they decide to give him a shave. Which, at that moment, causes Rambo to have PTSD flashbacks to his days at Vietnam, which causes him to fight back against the cops, and makes an escape, which then leads him into the woods on the mountain. And from there, it turns into a one man war with John Rambo trying survive against the cops that are going after him. And that's pretty much it for this movie's plot. Now admittedly, it could be seen as a two way street here. You could argue that the reason why this ultimately happens is because, thanks to Rambo's PTSD, he fights off the cops, which is normally a bad thing because he was resisting arrest and was fighting against officials at a local police department. But, I also have to interject here by stating that Will, the police chief, was the one who started all this, simply because of the fact that he didn't give Rambo any directions on where to find someplace to eat. And it's also possible that the police district Will runs is also wildly corrupt, because none of the cops there were giving Rambo any sort of fair treatment, which is why they all treated him like shit. So honestly, I believe that Rambo was justifiably in the right. Because he really did do nothing wrong. Oh sure, what he ends up doing later could be up for debate. But ultimately, before all that, Rambo was innocent. And any sympathy I may have had for these cops was completely gone because of their actions against Rambo.

As for our characters, the only ones that are even worth mentioning are John Rambo, Will, and Colonel Trautman. Trautman was the one Rambo served under at Vietnam. And Trautman doesn't make an appearance until about almost halfway into the movie, where he's there to try and get his soldier back, because he's the only one that might be able to get Rambo to listen to him. And he's the only person left who's close to Rambo because, outside of being his commanding officer, he's the only person that might considered a family to Rambo, since all of his war buddies are dead. So our characters here are very fleshed out, minus Will, who pretty much doesn't change at all in this movie. One other thing that I wanted to mention about this movie's writing is the amount of tension that this movie builds up. Whether it's the scene involving the cops where they were trying to find Rambo during a storm, or Rambo himself just trying to survive by going through the mines that he had set up camp at, or even towards the end of the movie where it really starts build up, everything about the tension works, because you have no idea how exactly it's going to go, or how it will end. Now granted, this movie is over 40 years old, so it's very well possible for anyone that has seen it already, possibly many times by this point, they know what's going to happen. But for any newcomers, like myself, you are going to feel the tension that goes on in this movie. Now admittedly, I don't know how that's going to hold up for you on repeated viewings of this film, but the first viewing will definitely pull you in with it's tension.

So yeah, guys, if it's not made any clearer, the writing in this movie is just that good. The story here is easy to follow and will definitely pull you in real quickly. And our characters here are, mostly, really likable. Again, with the one lone exception being Will. So yes, the writing here definitely works. What about the acting? Well, everyone here turns in a really good showing. And even though I fucking despised Will, the actor playing him, which I believe his name is Brian Dennehy, did a fantastic job of portraying that asshole police chief really well. And as for Stallone, well...this might just be me, but if I were to compare his performances in the "Rocky" movies to this one, I would honestly say that his performance in this movie is quite possibly one of, if not, the best one he has given out. Now mind you, I am not trying to dump his performances in the "Rocky" movies (I've only seen the first 4 in case anyone might ask), but I felt like he had a bit of a habit in hamming up his performances just a tad bit to where it sounded a bit too goofy. Now with this movie, while he kinda does do that towards the end where he starts to break down, it's handled better here because he doesn't really have a whole lot of dialogue to work with. Most of it is kept to a minimum, and it totally works for his character. And unlike the previous two "Shadow Warriors" movies I covered last month that both starred Hulk Hogan, he actually pulls of the stoic character very well, because Stallone was able to give out more of range in his acting, when he needed to. Since again, he has minimal dialogue in this movie. And the most emotion he gave out was during the ending. So yes, the acting here is really stellar from the entire cast.

Special effects are definitely also a highlight here. Most of it either contains the blood effects, which makes sense considering that the movie itself is literally called "First Blood", or the pyrotechnics, which mostly happens towards the latter half of the movie. And they all work really well here. Our costuming here is really good. The makeup effects are also done really well. Honestly, guys, I really don't have anything else notable to say about the special effects, other than the fact that they're really good.

Camerawork here is great. The lighting here is lit really well. Even in the scenes where Rambo is trying to find his way through caves is done really well, too, because the only thing he uses is a hand-made torch that he uses as his only source of light. All of that works really well. The sound-mix is mixed perfectly. The score here is great. And that's mostly because it was done by the late Jerry Goldsmith. Who was a master of bringing out great music. No matter the quality of the movie, whether it's great movies like "Rio Lobo" and Looney Tunes: Back in Action", or garbage movies like "Legend", he always knew how to give them great music. And this movie is no exception. The music here is great, and it definitely fits the tone of the film itself.

Ultimately, guys, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "First Blood"? Absolutely. This movie is fucking great, and I'm so glad that I'm finally able to get around to covering these movies. If you, yourself, want to get into the "Rambo" series, and you haven't had a chance to see these movies yet, this first movie is definitely a great start. It has a really good story, mostly good characters, and is definitely one of the finer action movies I've seen in a long time. Now I have no idea if the rest of the Rambo movies are gonna have the same amount of quality that this first movie had, but I'm definitely looking forward to finding out within the next couple of months. So yeah, guys, I'm totally able to recommend "First Blood" as a good starting point, if you're looking to get into the "Rambo" series. I'm hoping the rest of the movies in this series are gonna be as good, if not better than the first movie, but again, I'll have just have to wait and see for myself when I eventually get around to covering them for this series. For now, though, I'm gonna go and watch another action movie. And I'm kinda interested in watching "Judge Dredd" again. Seeing as how I just finished watching an action movie starring Sylvester Stallone, I kinda want to continue the Stallone trend and watch another movie that, while not great, is definitely a fun little action flick. So yeah, that's what I'm gonna go do next, after I'm done typing this review up.

And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.