Rambo IV (2008)

Rambo is a 2008 American action film directed and co-written by Sylvester Stallone, based on the character John Rambo created by author David Morrell for his novel First Blood. A sequel to Rambo III (1988), it is the fourth installment in the Rambo franchise and co-stars Julie Benz, Paul Schulze, Matthew Marsden, Graham McTavish, Rey Gallegos, Tim Kang, Jake La Botz, Maung Maung Khin, and Ken Howard. The film is dedicated to the memory of Richard Crenna, who died in 2003; he had played Colonel Sam Trautman in the previous films. In the film, Rambo (reprised by Stallone) leads a group of mercenaries into Burma to rescue Christian missionaries, who have been kidnapped by a local infantry unit. The rights to the Rambo franchise were sold to Miramax Films in 1997 after Carolco Pictures went bankrupt.

Miramax intended to produce a fourth film but Stallone was unmotivated to reprise the role. The rights were then sold to Nu Image and Millennium Films in 2005, who green-lit the film before the release of Rocky Balboa. Filming began in Thailand, Mexico, and the United States in January 2007, and ended in May 2007. Rambo was theatrically released on January 25, 2008, to mixed reviews, with praise and criticism aimed at the film’s violence, direction, plot, characters, and political commentary. It grossed $113.2 million worldwide against a production budget between $47.5–50 million. The film was followed by Rambo: Last Blood, released on September 20, 2019.

Plot.

Amid the political protests of the Saffron Revolution in Burma, ruthless SPDC officer Major Pa Tee Tint leads Burmese junta army forces in pillaging small villages in a campaign of fear. His soldiers sadistically slaughter innocents, abduct teenage boys to be drafted into his army and hold women hostage to be raped as sex slaves. Meanwhile, 20 years after the events in Afghanistan, Vietnam War veteran John Rambo is still living in Thailand, making a living as a snake catcher and by providing boat rides. Michael Burnett, a missionary doctor, attempts to hire Rambo to ferry his group up the Salween River into Burma on a humanitarian mission to provide medical aid to a village inhabited by the Karen people. Rambo initially refuses, then agrees when convinced by Michael’s fiancée Sarah Miller. During the trip, the boat is stopped by pirates demanding Sarah in exchange for passage, forcing Rambo to kill them.

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The missionaries arrive at the village but are attacked by Tint’s forces. Sarah, Michael, and other survivors are taken prisoners. The pastor of the missionaries’ church comes to Thailand and asks Rambo to guide a team of five mercenaries on a rescue mission. Rambo takes the mercenary to the drop-off point and offers to help, but Lewis, a former SAS soldier and the team’s leader, refuses. Myint, a Karen rebel familiar with the area, leads the mercenaries to the site of the massacre. As they survey the damage, a squad of Tint’s soldiers arrive in a truck with a group of prisoners, whom they proceed to torment. Rambo arrives in time and kills the soldiers with his bow and arrow, freeing the hostages. Rambo joins the mercenaries and they make their way to Tint’s camp at night, where they stealthily rescue the surviving hostages.

Filming.

Stallone stated that due to the small production budget the only way to make the film memorable was to make it graphically violent. He said “we were all sitting around in looking at the small production budget. Then I said ‘Hey, fake blood is cheap, lets make it all-out bloody.'” Filming started on January 22, 2007, and ended on May 4, 2007. It was shot in Chiang Mai, Thailand as well as in Mexico and the United States in Arizona and California. While filming near Burma, Stallone and the rest of the crew narrowly avoided being shot by the Burmese military. Stallone described Burma as a “hellhole”. He said, “We had shots fired above our heads” and that he “witnessed survivors with legs cut off and all kinds of land-mine injuries, maggot-infested wounds and ears cut off.”

Post-production.

John Rambo was the original working title for the film but was changed in the US because Stallone thought that audiences might think that this is the final film in the Rambo series (due to the then recently released Rocky Balboa), which was not his original intent. In many other countries, the title John Rambo is used because the first Rambo film was known as Rambo in those countries. The film premiered on US television as Rambo, but the title sequence referred to it as John Rambo. On October 12, 2007, Lionsgate announced that the film title was being changed to Rambo: After some negative feedback from the online community, Stallone spoke with Harry Knowles and said: Lionsgate jumped the gun on this. I just was thinking that the title John Rambo was derivative of Rocky Balboa and might give people the idea that this is the last Rambo film, and I don’t necessarily feel that it will be. He’s definitely a superb athlete, there’s no reason he can’t continue onto another adventure. Like John Wayne with The Searchers.

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Box office.

Rambo opened in 2,751 North American theaters on January 25, 2008, and grossed $6,490,000 on its opening day, and $18,200,000 over its opening weekend. It was the second highest-grossing movie for the weekend in the U.S. and Canada behind Meet the Spartans. The film has a box office gross of $113,344,290, of which $42,754,105 was from Canada and the United States. Europe’s biggest cinema chain (and the third biggest in the world), Odeon, refused to show the film on any of its screens in the United Kingdom, due to a dispute with its British distributor Sony Pictures over rental terms for the film. The film was shown in Ireland and the United Kingdom by other theater chains such as Empire Cinemas, Vue, Cineworld and Ward Anderson. The film was not shown in the French-speaking part of Switzerland due to legal and commercial problems with the distributor, even if it was available on screens of France and the Swiss German-speaking part.

Cast:

Sylvester Stallone as John Rambo
Julie Benz as Sarah Miller
Paul Schulze as Michael Burnett
Matthew Marsden as School Boy
Graham McTavish as Lewis
Tim Kang as En-Joo
Rey Gallegos as Diaz
Jake La Botz as Reese
Maung Maung Khin as Major Pa Tee Tint
Ken Howard as Father Arthur Marsh
Supakorn Kitsuwon as Myint
Aung Aay Noi as Lieutenant Aye
Sornram Patchimtasanakarn as Tha

Rambo IV (2008) Biography, Plot, Filming, Fight.