Review – First Blood

This is how America comes to grips with the Vietnam War. Or fails to come to grips, as the case may be. Actually, standing alone this isn’t a terrible movie. Vietnam-vet-turned-drifter Rambo (Sylvester Stallone in one of the two roles that made him famous) just wants to be left alone, but a small-town sheriff messes with him a bit too much. The bulk of the movie is taken up by a game of cat and mouse between the super-special-forces vet and local yokel deputies and National Guard. The point that America gave short shrift to the guys who served in Vietnam is well made and at the time of the movie’s original release was long overdue. The story is marred a bit by Col. Troutmann (Richard Crenna), whose constant carping about how Rambo has been trained to ignore things that would make a billy goat puke and will thus kick everybody’s asses makes him the movie’s answer to the Tweety Bird. And Stallone isn’t equal to the task when his character has to display emotions that can’t be conveyed via a constipated grimace. That notwithstanding, the production is reasonably entertaining and conveys what at the time was and to an extent remains an important message. The trouble with this series – the Reagan associations that accompany the name Rambo – really don’t start until the second movie in the set. Mildly amusing