Rambo: First Blood Part II

John Rambo got burned the second time around just like he did the first time. Once again, the ones he trusted were the explicitly bad ones, and once again, he took a pretty brutal revenge on them. It’s amazing how back then action movies were filmed with respect for the viewer. I enjoyed everything about it. The scenes with the bombing of the local wilderness were fantastic and that’s something absolutely unprecedented nowadays in movies. These days, digital effects are involved in everything and that’s not interesting at all, let alone honest. There aren’t many proper action movies, but if there’s one I’d like to rewatch, then it’s definitely Rambo. I’m rating it with four stars mostly because story-wise it’s practically the same as the first instalment. And Rambo’s speech in the finale wasn’t so great either. I was blown away by the first instalment more. Anyway, it’s awesome. It’s a classic, need I say more? (09/10/2012)

Rambo destroying computers with a shower of lead is one of the most beautiful mementos of the 1980s, as if Stallone was taking revenge on what would destroy his beloved genre. Paradoxically, in terms of psychology and ideas, the second film doesn't seem so far behind the (already quite retarded) first film, even though, instead of subjective nostalgia, programmable agitations are coming out of Rambo's mouth at the end. Cosmatos's film fits much more into the archetypes of the action 1980s and is irresistibly wooden and theatrical (or entertaining) in the most heated moments. The number of explosions is enormous, the pilot of the largest possible Soviet helicopter has not one red star on his helmet but two (so there is no confusion), and a POW with a machine gun in his hand, as if to remind the viewer of the beautiful ideological mishmash that ruled action Hollywood at the time. Can such a film not be loved even a little? (16/08/2010)

It's all here - action, corpses, Rambo's stone expressions, blood, of which there is much more than in the first one. Unfortunately, however, there is noticeably less quality filmmaking. The producers tested the audience's reaction with the first film and found that a significant part of moviegoers fall into the category of teenage boys, for whom this is simply enough. The film also had a strong propaganda dimension in the mid-80s, which today can only evoke an indulgent smile. Overall impression: 20%. (25/05/2009)

This is a movie that I've seen before and I thought it was the original first Rambo. Now I know my mistake and I'm quite glad that I clarified this chronology. The second film, however, is still a more famous piece, thanks in part to its parodies - see "Hot Shots! Part Deux". Sly and James Cameron, however, wrote a screenplay that is not just a shallow slaughter, but there is still something more here. John Rambo is no longer a man who needs to come to terms with the dark shadow of Vietnam, but he must deal with the consequences of the previous film. He may pay too high a price for freedom. (30/11/2013)

I have a lot of nostalgic memories of my childhood, when the "forbidden" Rambo was a myth for me and my friends during the Bolshevik era, a film that circulated on poorly dubbed cassettes. I'll never forget how we watched it at a friend's house and I felt like the biggest dissident under the sun, or like Rambo. When I saw it again years later, I had to laugh at what a naive but still brisk action film it is, and the fond memory of the weird 80s, full of bad taste :) (27/09/2003)