So this post is going to be the F- Blog’s first foray into popular culture, though many of you may argue that the bum on the bus was popular, I debate his lasting presence on the cultural scene. I mean, what’s he going to do to follow up? Drink wine and fall asleep in the park? Ask me for change on my way to Subway? We’ll just have to see.
But more to the point, this entry is concerned with the film John Rambo. This Sylvester Stallone vanity project got me out to the theaters twice (that’s right, twice) to try and comprehend the condensed suck I saw the screen vomiting forth. John Rambo, you get an F- and here’s why:
Your movie was the funniest thing I have seen all year, by far. I thought you were going to be a boring war movie, or a boring jungle combat movie, kind of like Predator if the titular predator wasn’t in it. But after being in the theater for about four minutes, I was laughing hysterically at the buckets of flying guts careening across my field of vision. I seriously saw what I think was a Burmese guy’s smoldering lung fly into the air before splashing down comically into a rice paddy. I wish I could say that about every movie I’ve watched recently (I’m looking at you, The Producers). He fucking vaporizes the driver of a jeep with mounted machine gun. He rips a guy’s throat out with his bare fucking hands. Yeah, that was his movie. This movie was like a 100-minute heavy metal music video without the pesky heavy metal.
Unfortunately, Stallone thought it would be a good idea to have the titular character, John Rambo, actually talk. It’s an easy mistake to make, I can almost understand it. But it was a grave mistake indeed. He tried to carry the extreme nature of the film over into the dialogue, which results in half-slurred gems like “fuck the world,” cascading out of the diagonal sneering mouth of Mr. Stallone. His pseudo-philosophical speeches stayed in the realm of humorless drama for the entirety of the film, ensuring that any moment when someone wasn’t exploding or being cut in half, the audience was still laughing.
I also loved how he completely dehumanized every non-white actor in the film, choosing to forego subtitles for the most part, turning them into gibbering caricatures of what Sly thinks south Asian people are like: evil sunglasses-wearing rapists, or rice-planting bullet-magnets. If a white character died, the camera was quick to zoom in on their suffering, so the audience knew that someone important was having their guts blasted out. But if a Burmese person died? Oh man, they were getting mowed down by the truckload, don’t even worry about them, Sylvester. We’ll just assume they deserved it for their godless heathen lives of wickedness, or whatever.
I think this movie was basically some kind of awesome joke Hollywood played on Sly, where he brought this insanely awful screenplay to them, and they were like “oh man, this is great! Why don’t you start shooting it tomorrow, little buddy?” the same way their refrigerators at home were plastered with pictures scribbled by their two-year-olds. “no, Sylvester, I love the character, I really (snickers) identified with a man who’s neck is wider than my waist, and how he’s filled with conflict, like whether or not to kill everyone with a machine gun or a machete that he just made himself in like 45 minutes. That is the kind of depth you just don’t see in those namby-pamby movies everyone else is putting time and effort into.”
Before I give this grade, I have to confess: I actually paid to see this movie, both times. It was fucking hysterical. The second time I saw it was at a second run theater, and there were homeless people asleep in some seats up front from the show before ours, who didn’t wake up and leave until the people started exploding. Yes, they would rather be back out on the streets than watch this movie again. But not me, I was in the back playing air guitar to the Iron Maiden song in my head while I watched the townspeople blow up like gore-filled piñatas.
That being said, Sylvester Stallone, I am giving you and your film John Rambo an F- (but an A for effort/being completely hilarious). If you would like to appeal this grade, or threaten to jam a homemade machete into my torso and then emote about it, or if you have suggestions for other things that suck, email me at johnnyjive@hotmail.com
But more to the point, this entry is concerned with the film John Rambo. This Sylvester Stallone vanity project got me out to the theaters twice (that’s right, twice) to try and comprehend the condensed suck I saw the screen vomiting forth. John Rambo, you get an F- and here’s why:
Your movie was the funniest thing I have seen all year, by far. I thought you were going to be a boring war movie, or a boring jungle combat movie, kind of like Predator if the titular predator wasn’t in it. But after being in the theater for about four minutes, I was laughing hysterically at the buckets of flying guts careening across my field of vision. I seriously saw what I think was a Burmese guy’s smoldering lung fly into the air before splashing down comically into a rice paddy. I wish I could say that about every movie I’ve watched recently (I’m looking at you, The Producers). He fucking vaporizes the driver of a jeep with mounted machine gun. He rips a guy’s throat out with his bare fucking hands. Yeah, that was his movie. This movie was like a 100-minute heavy metal music video without the pesky heavy metal.
Unfortunately, Stallone thought it would be a good idea to have the titular character, John Rambo, actually talk. It’s an easy mistake to make, I can almost understand it. But it was a grave mistake indeed. He tried to carry the extreme nature of the film over into the dialogue, which results in half-slurred gems like “fuck the world,” cascading out of the diagonal sneering mouth of Mr. Stallone. His pseudo-philosophical speeches stayed in the realm of humorless drama for the entirety of the film, ensuring that any moment when someone wasn’t exploding or being cut in half, the audience was still laughing.
I also loved how he completely dehumanized every non-white actor in the film, choosing to forego subtitles for the most part, turning them into gibbering caricatures of what Sly thinks south Asian people are like: evil sunglasses-wearing rapists, or rice-planting bullet-magnets. If a white character died, the camera was quick to zoom in on their suffering, so the audience knew that someone important was having their guts blasted out. But if a Burmese person died? Oh man, they were getting mowed down by the truckload, don’t even worry about them, Sylvester. We’ll just assume they deserved it for their godless heathen lives of wickedness, or whatever.
I think this movie was basically some kind of awesome joke Hollywood played on Sly, where he brought this insanely awful screenplay to them, and they were like “oh man, this is great! Why don’t you start shooting it tomorrow, little buddy?” the same way their refrigerators at home were plastered with pictures scribbled by their two-year-olds. “no, Sylvester, I love the character, I really (snickers) identified with a man who’s neck is wider than my waist, and how he’s filled with conflict, like whether or not to kill everyone with a machine gun or a machete that he just made himself in like 45 minutes. That is the kind of depth you just don’t see in those namby-pamby movies everyone else is putting time and effort into.”
Before I give this grade, I have to confess: I actually paid to see this movie, both times. It was fucking hysterical. The second time I saw it was at a second run theater, and there were homeless people asleep in some seats up front from the show before ours, who didn’t wake up and leave until the people started exploding. Yes, they would rather be back out on the streets than watch this movie again. But not me, I was in the back playing air guitar to the Iron Maiden song in my head while I watched the townspeople blow up like gore-filled piñatas.
That being said, Sylvester Stallone, I am giving you and your film John Rambo an F- (but an A for effort/being completely hilarious). If you would like to appeal this grade, or threaten to jam a homemade machete into my torso and then emote about it, or if you have suggestions for other things that suck, email me at johnnyjive@hotmail.com
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