Reaction & Review | Rambo III

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, we continue the Rambo series by taking a look at the third entry that came out in 1988. That movie is "Rambo III".

Now unlike the previous two films in this series, where I falsely predicted what the plots were going to be about for those respective movies, I actually do know a little bit about the plot to this third movie. Because I actually did, at one point, watch a little bit of this movie on TV years ago. And I believe it was airing on AMC, back when AMC use to air movies that were worth caring for. I didn't give a shit about their TV shows, but that's beside the point. Point is, I actually did use to watch a little bit of this movie on that network, and it's the only film in the Rambo series that I do have a little bit of knowledge on. Now mind you, I didn't watch the entirety of it. Like I said, I only caught about a few minutes of it before I changed the channel to watch something else. But what I watched looked really fascinating, and I wanted to watch the other two Rambo films first before I got to this one. And thus, here we are.

Now I did say that I knew a little bit about the plot to this movie. And from what I remembered, Colonel Trautman somehow gets captured in Afghanistan and Rambo has to go there in order to save him. I don't know much else beyond that one thing, so I really have no idea on how this movie is going to play itself out. I'm hoping that it's gonna be as good as the previous two Rambo films, if not better. Now I understand that a lot of sequels usually drop in quality when it comes to further entries in whatever given franchise. However, I have heard mostly positive things about this third movie. So, I'm hoping that it's gonna be great. And the only way I'm gonna find that out, 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 "Rambo III".

14 minutes later

Guys, I already made a couple of comments on this in the previous two Rambo films, but the music in this movie is fucking amazing. But then again, it's from Jerry Goldsmith. And he was a legend at his craft, so I guess it would make sense that the music would already be great by default, you know what I mean?

15 minutes later

Well, I can certainly say that, even though Trautman is being tortured by this Russian general that wants to know where these stinger missiles are, Trautman gave out a pretty simple, yet hilarious, response by telling him that they were up his ass. That was pretty awesome.

16 minutes later

OK...well, despite quite a number of casualties being dealt to the rebel forces that Rambo has been working with, at least he was able to take down one of the choppers. So, I guess you gotta take the good with the bad in this scenario, I guess.

9 minutes later

Wow, I never thought you could do that with a moving tank. Where you can just grab onto one of the cords and just hide yourself beneath the tank as long as you don't lose your grip. I never would've known that, but hey, you learn something new everyday, don't ya?

14 minutes later

Guys, I want to reiterate this point again from what I said in the first movie. I'm thankful that I've never been physically hurt to a point where I had to take some sort of metal object and use it to stick it through my body in order to fix a blood wound! Plus side is, at least this wound isn't pulsating a ton of blood from his arm like it was in the first movie. But still, that has gotta fucking hurt like hell.

1 minute later

OK, that may have done it! Oh god, that looked incredibly painful just to see that kind of fire coming from his body like that. Holy shit...

9 minutes later

And just like the previous movie, we had an awesome explosion from that bow and arrow of Rambo's. Now I'm kinda curious as to how I can get my hands on one of those? Seriously, guys, I want that fucking bow and arrow.

7 minutes later

Well, guys, I think I just found the best creative kill in this entire movie. And it may honestly reach up as probably one of the best kills in the entire Rambo series so far! And no, I'm not gonna tell you what it is, you're just gonna have to watch the movie for yourself.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Rambo III". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. Wow, that certainly was an ending! Now I'm curious as to how the hell they continue with this franchise, considering the next entry and all. But I can ponder on that later.

For now, though, let's dive right into this review. And as per usual, I'm gonna start with the writing. The first thing I want to touch upon is the pacing. Because if you'll recall my review of "Rambo: First Blood Part II", I mentioned that the pacing in that thing was a bit slow. At least, when it came to building up it's action scenes. Where it started off kinda slow and it gave the movie a little bit of downtime for our characters, and then it slowly built itself up towards the action scenes that we would see later on in the film. Now mind you, I'm not saying that it was a bad thing that the movie had to slow down a bit, but I could see that as a potential negative for some people who just want to get to those action scenes right away. Well, this movie goes back to what the first movie had done, in which we go straight into it without almost any distractions. In fact, I'll go on record to say that this movie has fantastic pacing. At almost no point does this movie feel like it's dragging it's own feet around. You're going to be sucked in to what is going on in this movie, because it never has any dull moments. It just keeps going at a fluid pace, and it never stops. My eyes were glued onto the TV screen, because I really wanted to see where this movie was going to go next! That's how much investment I had when it came to this movie. And for an action movie like this, it's saying a lot. I'll briefly mention this again later on, but this movie definitely left a positive impression on me.

As for our story, well, it's what I surmised earlier. And thankfully, unlike the previous Rambo films, in which I wrongly predicted the plots to those movies, I actually got it right this time. But then again, I mentioned earlier that I watched a little bit of this movie on TV years ago, so that kinda helped things for me. As I mentioned, Colonel Trautman gets captured a little after Rambo refuses to go back to war because he wants to live a peaceful life in Thailand, where he's kinda made a home for himself there, while also being a friend to some of the local villagers there, too. This then leads to Colonel Trautman's capture, shortly after he and a squad go to Afghanistan. In which, it leads to Trautman's squad being killed while he is the only one left alive. And it doesn't take long for Rambo to hear the news, which came from one of the men that was with Trautman from the beginning of the movie. Which then causes Rambo to go to Afghanistan to save his close friend, while also dealing with some Russian soldiers, who have occupied a base there. And as for the Russians, they're trying to gain some kind of information regarding some missiles that Trautman may know the location to so that they can gain the upper hand in the war that's going on in Afghanistan. And honestly, beyond that, there's not much else here for a story. It's pretty simple and straight to the point, and doesn't really try to aim for anything too complex for a plot. Which, for an action movie, is totally fine.

That being said, let's get into the characters. And this is something that could normally be seen as a huge negative, at least for me, anyway. You see, in the previous two Rambo films, you got to learn bits and pieces about Rambo himself. You got to learn a little bit about his time in the war through his PTSD flashbacks, you got to see how he earned a reputation as a one man war hero, and you get to see him share a little bit of character development in the second movie. I mention all this, because this movie does NOT explore any sort of character development whatsoever. At least, when compared to the other two Rambo movies, this one does nothing in order to enhance the characters. It mostly falls into the plotless action film category, in which it gives us a standard plot, and we just see it play itself out while the action scenes mostly take over from there. The closest thing that this movie explores when it comes to any kind of development is through a bit of social commentary about the Pakistanis and the consequences of the war that's going on in Afghanistan. But that's only brought up in about one scene, and it never gets mentioned again. And for the most part, again, it mostly plays itself out like a plotless action movie. And in most cases, I would say that would be a detriment to a lot of action movies. But...this is one of those movies that is able to get away with that. Because like I mentioned earlier, I was totally invested into what was going on in this movie. So it really didn't bother me here to where I didn't get enough character development, because I STILL cared about Rambo himself, and even Colonel Trautman, who gets a couple of moments to shine here. And that's mostly because of the previous two movies that I watched that I was able to learn about them and they gave me reasons to care about both of their characters.

So yes, guys, the writing here, while most definitely plotless, is still strong enough to where it can totally bypass it's lack of character depth. And that, coupled with the fact that we have really awesome action scenes and a story which will still keep you interested from beginning to end, makes this movie a blast to get through. Now with that being said, let's get into the acting. The acting here, at least when it comes to our returning cast members like Sylvester Stallone as Rambo and Richard Crenna as Colonel Trautman, they still turn in really good showings. The only one that I felt was a little bit weak was the kid that partly follows Rambo throughout a small portion of the film. However, I'm not going to harp on his performance too much here, because unlike the previous movie that I covered, AKA "The Garbage Pail Kids Movie", which had a child actor that mostly kinda sucked because of his lengthy dialogue scenes, this child actor was given very minimal dialogue to work with. Now I don't know if that was partly because he couldn't speak English very well, or if he wasn't trained enough in regards to his acting, but regardless, he still gave out a serviceable performance that thankfully didn't tank this entire movie if he was in it for that much longer. As for the rest of the cast, they turned in really good showings, too. So really, I can't say much else about the acting, outside of it being really good.

Special effects in this movie are also really good, too. But then again, most of it consists of the pyrotechnics, and the squibs that are used for the guns. I will say that when it comes to the explosions in this movie, they are not as happy-go-lucky about it as they were in "Rambo: First Blood Part II". Where in that movie, the explosions there would be enough to give Michael Bay an orgasm. However, this movie sorta dials the explosions back a bit. They still exist, but it's mostly reserved for two particular scenes. Once, during the infiltration scene at night. And the other being the last act of the movie, in which I won't try to spoil anything there. But beyond that, the pyrotechnics are still really cool to see. And as I said, the squib work for the guns is still really good, and the blood effects here are also really good, too. So yeah, the special effects here are really good, overall.

Camerawork here is really good. The lighting here is great. The sound-mix is also mixed perfectly. The score here, for the third time in a row, is done by Jerry Goldsmith. And if it wasn't a dead giveaway earlier, the music here is absolutely fantastic. In fact, I would say that this is the best score so far from him, at least when it comes to the Rambo movies, anyway. But still, the music here is fantastic. And I know for a fact that this kind of score won't be used for the next Rambo film, because Jerry Goldsmith had long since passed away before that movie came around. But anyway, I'm not going to harp on that any longer, because he helped made these first 3 Rambo films sound great. And I honestly couldn't have asked for a better composer for these particular movies.

So with that being said, guys, can I recommend "Rambo III"? Oh, hell yes, guys, this movie is fucking amazing! Now granted, if you haven't seen the first two Rambo movies, I would strongly recommend you go watch those two films before you dive into this one, what with it being the third movie and all. And if you enjoyed the first two Rambo movies, then you're going to love this third one. It is a fantastic action movie. And despite it having an incredibly thin plot, and our characters not getting any development, this movie is still able to roll with it. Because we have our recurring characters that are still worth caring about, and our story here is still really solid. This movie is one of the very rare instances in which it being plotless TOTALLY makes this thing worth watching. I loved just about everything that went on in this movie. Now I don't entirely know if it's better than Part II, because I still REALLY enjoyed Part II. However, I can definitely say, at least for me, that it's better than the first movie. Not the first movie is bad by any means, it's just that this movie proved to be a little bit better in my eyes. So yes, guys, I can definitely recommend "Rambo III". Provided, again, that you watch the first two movies first, THEN you can dive right into the third movie. And as for how I'm feeling going into the fourth film in this series...I don't know. I'm just gonna wait patiently until I get to it in a couple of weeks. For now, though, I'm gonna go and watch another action movie. I think I'll go and watch the first "Starship Troopers" movie. Why? Because it's been a while since I've seen it. And, at least to me, it's still one of the finest sci-fi action movies I have seen in many years. So I'm gonna go and do that after I get done writing this review up.

Anyway, guys, with that, 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.