Rambo III (1988) review

The first Rambo film is a true action classic and the second film is a true disappointment. Even though a disappointment, Rambo II wasn’t a terrible film and it was a truly enjoyable film still giving us Rambo-like moments. However, Rambo III is what completely destroys everything about the series and we are treated with an extremely slow and overly emotionalized story that doesn’t need to be. New characters aren’t interesting and even the action sequences aren’t that entertaining.

Sylvester Stallone is definitely a joy to watch in these films. His physical talent and his endurance and strength are so clearly evident when watching a Rambo film. Not only is he a physical guy but he is a truly underrated actor. He gives yet another great performance in the film but possibly, not as great as the first two. Reason being is that in this film Rambo seems to talk more often, especially delivering corny dialogue towards the end of the film with Richard Crenna’s, Trautman. These two are the only good thing in the film but surprisingly enough, when you put them together in an action scene in this film, it turns out pretty bad.

Trautman returns to John Rambo with a  mission to go to Afghanistan but John refuses and Trautman decides to continue with the mission as planned but  Trautman is captured by Afghan terrorists as John must venture where he had no intention of going to save his only friend.

When the word ‘Rambo’ pops into one’s mind, they immediately think of a jungle and Rambo being in one. The reason that Rambo III should never be called a Rambo film is that, not once in the film are we shown a jungle. Instead, Rambo is shown in the open even more than he was in the previous film. The jungle is easily the best location that a Rambo film could have an action scene, and the fact that most occurs in sandy wastelands truly doesn’t make it phenomenal. Most of the action scenes are uninteresting, the characters are annoying and forgettable and the story attempts to humanize itself too much by providing emotional sequences involving civilians explaining to Rambo about their life. Whilst this isn’t terrible, it gets worse and worse as this is done again differently. The reason that ‘First Blood’ worked amazingly well is how little emotional scenes were shown yet how effective it was. Rambo III is the exact opposite of ‘First Blood’ and indicates that sticking to original source material works best, especially when trying to make sequels to action classics.

‘Rambo III’ is definitely the worst of the first three Rambo films, full of uninteresting characters and action sequences, not a single scene in a jungle making this a Rambo film an invalid statement and attempts to humanize itself too much making it that much more frustrating. Rambo III, most definitely isn’t a great example of how to make an action sequel. Not only is it nothing like its original, but it is also a very slow paced film that had me checking my watch a few too many times, something which the previous two films didn’t. 

Grade- 2.5/10