Rambo: First Blood Part II

The change in style away from the low-key and raw part one is perhaps a little too extreme. John Rambo’s second battle for survival unfortunately degenerated into a pure B-grade action movie. Although the truth is it’s quite fun. Here in the Czech Republic, though, Rambo: First Blood Part II will more likely be remembered as one of the first VHS cult movies, rather than a movie known for its qualities. (09/02/2022)

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)

Not nearly as good as the first one, Rambo II is a typical example of the sequel syndrome: a bigger budget, more action, more visual effects, less story, less atmosphere. The beginning is still quite interesting, as it practically starts right where the first part ended, but then it goes downhill. (05/07/2005)

The second installment is clearly the most cerebral work about John Rambo. On the other hand, it is so beautifully crystal clear in its humor ("Rambo, you made good choice") that it has an irreplaceable place within the series. It's never going to be the best Rambo film (that's still the luxurious fourth Rambo for me), but the honestly acknowledged comedic parts and its indelible imprint on pop culture are what make the second one the second one. "What you choose to call ‘hell’, he calls home." (21/09/2019)

Even though Rambo: First Blood Part II, with its mission to rescue America’s self-confidence after the debacle of the Vietnam War, seems rather ridiculous from today’s perspective, it has two strengths that cannot be denied. The first of these is the outrageously honest craftsmanship of the action sequences. Though the film’s anti-choreography and concept of guerrilla spec-ops combat come across as quite laughable, all of these drawbacks are offset by the precise topography of the action, the dynamic editing and, mainly, the superb camerawork, which ceaselessly emphasises the real physical dimension of every shot (the composition with the view to the protagonist from inside the helicopter cabin with the landscape in motion in the second plane behind the glass was definitely copied by Tom Cruise’s team in Mission: Impossible – Fallout). The film’s other strength is its indisputable status as a pop-culture phenomenon, which is based on rare, inimitable harmonisation of the work’s ethos with the audience’s mood at the time. Though critics on both sides of the Iron Curtain slammed the film, it set box-office records in the West (both in the US and in Europe) and it enjoyed even greater success in cultural terms in the Eastern Bloc through illegal underground distribution, though of course without the financial gains. The bellowing hulk with a strip of cloth tied around his head, armed with a bow and explosive arrows, and killing cartoonishly depicted commies became the embodiment of the ideal of America at the height of the Cold War. Rambo wasn’t Superman or any other particular hero with specific traits and virtues, but like the Berlin Wall, the film concentrated within itself the mood of the decaying Soviet system and a society that had grown tired of the stalemate and the status quo. Whereas in America the film soothed the ego of conservatives and licked their wounds after losing a war, in both Western and Eastern Europe it represented an energising fantastical pressure valve for a frustrated society. Rambo: First Blood Part II became both an icon of and a synonym for its era and it remains embedded in society’s memory even in the new millennium. But everything written here refers solely to this particular film. Because of that and despite all of Stallone’s misguided attempts, none of the sequels can build on that legacy with all of its meanings, nor can they repeat its box-office success. (01/10/2023)