FILM REVIEW OF ''BETWEEN HEAVEN AND HELL" (1956)

“Violent Saturday” director Richard Fleischer’s explosive, bullet-riddled epic “Between Heaven & Hell” combines the plot about clashes between subordinates and their superior officers set against the backdrop of World War II combat in the Pacific with the problem melodrama about Old and New South social consciousness. Robert Wagner starts out as an elitist, bourbon & branch water swilling, Southern cotton gin operator who displays no sympathy for his poor sharecroppers. Before this sturdy 94-minute, Cinemascope movie fades out, the protagonist turns over a new leaf and becomes a more considerate individual who is concerned about the welfare of his workers. The clash between officers in Fleischer’s film reached the screen a mere six days before director Robert Aldritch’s cynical wartime thriller “Attack.” “Between Heaven and Hell” came out October 11, 1956, while “Attack” debuted October 17, 1956. Nevertheless, “Attack” ranks as a more compelling outing because Robert Wagner’s NCO doesn’t kill the pusillanimous officer, while Lt. Harold 'Harry' Woodruff (William Smithers) in “Attack” kills a cowardly officer. Interestingly enough, Buddy Ebsen appeared in both movies as a G.I. Unlike “Attack,” “Between Heaven and Hell” confronts the issue of inequity between poor whites and affluent whites in the Old South. Actually, “Attack” surpasses “Between Heaven and Hell,” but the latter picture adds weight to the trend in American World War II movies about clashes between commanders and subordinates. Like the Aldritch film, “Between Heaven and Hell” painted an unsavory portrait of life in the military that showed American soldiers with feet of clay that films such as “The Naked and the Dead,” “Tarawa Beachhead” and “The Victors” would build on in later years.

The Fleischer film opens with two soldiers escorting Private Sam Francis Gifford (Robert Wagner of “Titanic”) to see Lieutenant Colonel Miles (Frank Gerstle of “D.O.A”) about a disciplinary problem. The military authorities have arrested Sam for attempting to kill a superior officer, Lieutenant Ray Mosby (Tod Andrews of “In Harm’s Way”), who ironically was one of his closest drinking buddies before the war broke out. Matters are complicated somewhat because Sam has received a Silver Star for dangling himself off the side of a cliff to sling explosives into a Japanese machine gun emplacement in a cave, a setting that suggests that this exploit occurred on Guadalcanal. Since Sam has won the medal, Miles prefers to send him to serve with George Company rather than imprison him in Leavenworth. The grim dialogue between Sam and the driver of the jeep, Private Willie Crawford (Buddy Ebsen of “Parachute Battalion”) suggests that prison would be preferable. Crawford observes as he hands his M-1 rifle to Sam. “Go ahead and kill someone, I don't care. How did you get in this outfit?" Sam replies without enthusiasm, "It was that or Leavenworth." Crawford shrugs, "Shoulda taken Leavenworth."

Sam meets his new superior officer, Captain 'Waco' Grimes, Commanding Officer, who stipulates that nobody can call him by his rank. Waco dreads that a Japanese sniper will kill him, so he insists that nobody refer to him by his rank. Waco keeps two Thompson machine-gun wielding soldiers at his sides at all times, Private. Swanson (Skip Homeier of “The Gunfighter”) and Private Millard (Frank Gorshin of “Batman”), and they wear only t-shirts on this upper chests rather than proper combat fatigues. Waco makes Sam his radio operator and Sam leaves to wander the new camp. He stretches out on the ground after Waco dismisses him and stares into a mud hole. The surface of the mud hole ripples when Sam tosses a pebble in it and the film shifts into flashback mode some 15 minutes into the action to take us back before Pearl Harbor to the South when Sam was a heartless but well-heeled cotton gin operator who had married Jenny (Terry Moore of “Mighty Joe Young”) and they were living high off the hog. We learn that Jenny’s father, Colonel Cousins (Robert Keith of “Branded”), commands Sam’s National Guard outfit and organizes it to mobilize overseas.

Before his call to duty after Pearl Harbor, Sam reprimands the laziness of his sharecroppers and treats them like dirt. Sam becomes buddies up with several G.I.s, and they become fast friends, foremost a down-to-earth country boy named Private Crawford. They really bond when Pvt. Bernard "Bernie" Meleski (Harvey Lembeck of “Stalag 17”) pretends that he is an officer to obtain two case of beer. Lieutenant Mosby sends Sam and his friends in to check out a village. The sight of a snake sends a chill down Mosby’s spine. Caught up short by a case of frayed nerves, Mosby accidentally fires the machine gun after Meleski knocks down a porch awning. The sight of watching Meleski and his friends getting mowed down propels Sam headlong toward Mosby. He clobbers the lieutenant with his rifle butt and ends up behind the stockade.

According to the American Film Institute, John Sturges was scheduled to helm it. Guy Madison was up for the Robert Wagner role and Twentieth Century Fox contract actress Joan Collins was considered for the role that Terry Moore inherited. “Between Heaven and Hell” suffers minimally from the usual idiocy that afflicts many Hollywood World War II movies. Specifically, American officers wear their rank on the front of their helmets—rather than the rear--making him easy for vigilant Japanese snipers. Unlike most World War II movies, an officer here who dons his helmet with his rank prominently on show dies from a sharpshooting enemy marksman. Top-notch photography by “The Day the Earth Stood Still” lenser Leo Tover gives “Between Heaven and Hell” a sprawling, virile appearance, that belies its actual location at the Twentieth Century-Fox ranch in the Santa Monica Mountains, while “Dead Reckoning” composer Hugo Friedhofer received an Academy Award nomination for his orchestral score. Fleischer conjures up commendable suspense and excitement primarily with the standard theme of friendship; soldiers who buddy up suddenly have to confront the loss of their new-found friends. Meanwhile, this above-average combat opus boasts a cast of first-class thespians that includes Broderick Crawford, Buddy Ebsen, Brad Dexter, Ken Clark, Frank Gorshin, Skip Homeier, and Harvey Lembeck. Fleischer and “D-Day, The Sixth of June” & “A Walk in the Sun” scenarist Harry Brown, who adapted Arkansas-born novelist Francis Gwaltney’s 1955 fiction book “The Day the Century Ended,” give their military fans more than enough firefights to past muster. Interestingly, Rod Serling tried without success to adapt the Gwaltney novel. Moreover, Gwaltney was a Pacific campaign veteran. Fleischer refrains from demonizing the Japanese and presents them as an impersonal but dangerous enemy.

FILM REVIEW OF ''AVATAR" (2009)

The highly touted and long anticipated "Avatar" (*** out of ****) from writer & director James Cameron of "Titanic" fame qualifies as a predictable but entertaining sci-fi culture clash between the aggressive, technology-driven human race and a primitive, agrarian-fueled alien society. Mankind has shipped in mind-boggling machinery to plunder the planet of a mineral called Unobtanium worth an astronomical fortune. The complication is an entire race of Smurf-colored, Zulu-tall, humanoid aliens called the Na'vi worships a gigantic tree rooted in the same soil as the priceless minerals.

Basically, "Avatar" pits tree-huggers against tree-haters. Indeed, the story is as venerable as any cavalry western about the white hero who joins a clueless Indian tribe living atop a hopelessly rich gold strike. Although he acts as a go-between, the hero betrays his own kind and sides with the Indians to preserve the land rather than let his own people rape it. Unfortunately, Cameron generates minimal emotion from this "Dances with Wolves" melodrama. More problematic from the standpoint of credibility is the hybrid storyline. "Avatar" alternates, albeit it smoothly, between being a feature-length cartoon like “FernGully, The Last Rainforest” and a Big Dumb "Matrix" Action Movie stocked with stereotypes. Historically, "Avatar" pays tribute to the legendary Pocahontas and Captain John Smith romance.

"Avatar" takes place in the year 2145, on the distant planet of Pandora, after mankind has depleted all its natural resources on Earth. No, this has nothing to do with the terrible sci-fi thriller "Pandorum" that starred Dennis Quaid. "Avatar" and "Pandorum" are two entirely separate sci-fi sagas. After his intellectually-gifted twin-brother is shot and killed by a mugger, Jack Scully--who is paralyzed from the waist down--is selected to replace him for a top-secret mission. A former Marine, Jake (Sam Worthington of "Terminator: Salvation") is shipped off to distant Pandora to resolve tensions with the native Na'vi people so his fellow earthlings can excavate the Unobtanium. Jake sprawls out in a cylindrical chamber and projects his consciousness into his flesh & blood avatar to control it. The avatar is a genetically bred replica of Pandora's indigenous Na'vi tribe. This avatar includes both human and Na'vi genetic material. Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang of "Tombstone") commands the Earth project to extract the Unobtanium and he amounts to a one-dimensional "Rambo" villain. Meaning, he won't be easy to kill. Stephen Lang makes a terrific villain who wants to see this peaceful but noble people destroyed.

Colonel Quaritch considers biologist Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver of "Aliens") a complete nuisance, but corporate representative Parker Selfridge (Giovanni Ribisi of "The Mod Squad") lets Grace perform her diplomatic initiative to gain the trust and cooperation of the Na'vi. Secretly, Quaritch has cut a deal with Jake. If Jake can deliver the intelligence about the Na'vi that Quaritch needs, then he will have the medical gurus restore the use of Jake's legs. Meanwhile, Grace treats Jake with nothing but contempt. She refers to him as a "Jarhead dropout." Jake is separated from Grace and company during a helicopter ride into the jungle and he has to fend for himself in the wild. Neytiri nearly kills Jake when she encounters him at first, but something happens that she has rarely seen in nature and she spares Jake his life.

Meanwhile, the wise head of the Na'vi clan, Neytiri's father (Wesley Studi of "Last of the Mohicans") orders her to train Jake, in his avatar form about their ways so they can better study him. Naturally, Jake falls in love with a maiden warrior princess Neytiri (Zoe Saldana of "Star Trek") and she introduces Jake to the jungle and its dangers. Neytiri seems more like an Environmentalist version of "Mulan" and she is no slouch when she has to shoot arrows. Inevitably, as conventions dictate, the heroine falls in love with the hero and they become inseparable. Along the way, Jake learns how to use his tail to ride a giant sky lizard and later an even bigger sky lizard.

According to Hindu mythology, an avatar is a deity who takes human form and descended to earth. An avatar in computer parlance is an icon that a person adopts for use in virtual reality or cyberspace. In "Avatar," the avatar is a prefabricated body controlled by brain waves emitted by a human who functions as the body's driver. Cameron spends most of the first half-hour shoving exposition down our throats because he has to bring us up to speed on a brave new universe and its colorful but mysterious people. Of course, the special effects are awesome, but you need not see "Avatar" in 3-D because it refrains from exploiting the technology the way most 3-D movies do. In other words, rarely does anything come flying out at you. The planet of Pandora with its floating mountains and luminous fauna is a treat for the eye. Pandora looks like an underwater planet without water, and the beasts that lurk in its lush jungle vaguely resemble our prehistoric dinosaurs.

Nevertheless, despite its imposing 160-minute running time, Cameron maintains sufficient momentum to see things through to the kick-butt finale between good and evil. Some of the technology the avaricious earthlings import to the Pandora may remind you of the second "Alien" movie, "Aliens," which was helmed by Cameron. Of course, "Gamer" and "Surrogates" beat Cameron to the punch with their stories about an avatar-oriented society. The visual spectacle and splendor of "Avatar" with its floating mountains and its "Black Hawk Down" aerial sequences will hold your attention. Again, the Zulu Smurfs with Submariner ears and "Lion King" snouts never conjure up a tenth of the emotional charisma of a live-action character. In this respect, Cameron has embraced the performance capture technology espoused by Robert Zemeckis in his last three films. In other words, the sentiment is not sticky enough because they lack depth as characters.

FILM REVIEW OF ''MOSQUITO SQUADRON'' (1969)

“633 Squadron” producer Lewis J. Rachmil let “Girl Happy” director Boris Sagal recycle exciting aerial combat footage from “633 Squadron” for his generic World War II thriller “Mosquito Squadron,” (** out of ****) starring David McCallum and Charles Gray. This lackluster epic combines elements of 1964’s “633 Squadron,” principally the plywood built De Havilland Mosquito fighter-bombers, with 1954’s “The Dam Busters,” with a bouncing bomb designed to destroy a top secret German weapons facility. The Germans are developing the V-3 rocket, and British Intelligence has located the site in the French countryside at the Chateau de Charlon. Air Commodore Hufford (Charles Gray of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”) assigns Squadron Leader Quint Munro (David McCallum of “The Great Escape”) to bomb it with special ordinance. This low-budget melodrama set in England and France has very little to recommend it. Again, 90 percent of the shots of Mosquitoes winging their way over enemy country were appropriated from Walter E. Grauman’s classic “633 Squadron.” The prefabricated screenplay by Donald S. Sanford and Joyce Perry antes up one surprise, but everything else is formula served up without verve by Sagal.

Our British heroes are streaking toward their target, a V-2 rocket launching pad, on the French coast as “Mosquito Squadron” opens, using footage from Michael Anderson’s “Operation: Crossbow.” Incidentally, Anderson directed “The Dam Busters,” too. The British manage to destroy the missile launching ramp, but a flight of Messerschmidts jump them and blow Squadron Leader David 'Scotty' Scott (David Buck of “The Mummy’s Shroud”) out of the air. Quint Munro spots no parachute at the crash site and assumes ‘Scotty’ is kaput. Scotty’s death elevates Quint to Squadron Leader. Worse, our protagonist has lost a friend who was as close to him as a brother. Scotty and Quint grew up together because Quint’s parents died and Scotty’s parents raised him. Quint even handed off one of his former girlfriends, Beth (Suzanne Neve of “Bunny Lake Is Missing”), who wound up marrying Scotty. After a reasonable period of mourning, Beth and Quint take long bicycle rides in the country.

Air Commodore Hufford sends Quint off on a reconnaissance mission to photograph the Chateau de Charlon where the British insist that the Germans are working industriously to make a V-3. V-2 rockets are falling on London and wrecking havoc. Hufford shows Quint some film footage of a bomb that bounces on any terrain, no mean feat. In real life, the bomb was the genuine article and was called a ‘Highball’ and had been designed to use on battlewagons like the Tirpitz. Meanwhile, now that the Germans realize the British are interested in their installation at the Chateau, they drop a canister of film which shows that they have gathered British POWs as hostages against any bombing runs. The revelation that Scotty is among those prisoners comes as a quite a shock to Quint. Security prevents him from telling Beth about it. Initially, nobody wants to give the Germans a propaganda coup by killing their own men. Quint devises a way to kill two birds with one stone. Not only will they destroy the laboratory tucked into an underground facility with the ‘Highball’ bomb, but also they will breach the wall at the Chateau so the French Resistance can storm the Chateau. The closest thing to a villain in “Mosquito Squadron” is a German Lieutenant named Schack (Vladek Sheybal of “From Russia with Love”) who suspects that the Allies prisoners are plotting something when they all turn out for mass on a Sunday, especially when some of them aren’t Catholic. The suspicious Sheybal shows his villainy when shoots a Catholic priest with a machine gun. The POWs overpower their guards and fortify themselves in the chapel as the Mosquitoes appear to bomb the premises.

Quint and his Mosquito Squadron destroy the underground facility, but our hero has to crash his plane. Once on the ground, Quint runs into Scotty, but Scotty cannot remember his own identity, and he sacrifices his life heroically by blowing up a German tank with a bazooka after several others have tried and failed. A wounded Quint makes it back to England and reunites with Beth. As it turns out, Beth never learned that her late husband survived the crash only to die in France as a casualty of a combined British & French Resistance operation. There is a subplot about Beth’s younger brother who has to show the film that the Germans have dropped for the benefit of our heroes. When he threatens to spill the beans about Scotty, the authorities lock him up for the duration.

“Mosquito Squadron” qualifies as a hack attempt to cash in on “633 Squadron,” “Operation Cross-Bow,” and “The Dam Busters.” Boris Sagal made a couple of memorable movies and television shows, but “Mosquito Squadron” isn’t among them. Worse, “Mosquito Squadron” was cranked out by Oakmont Productions which ground out several cheapjack World War II thrillers, including another Sagal saga “The One-Thousand Plane Raid”, “The Last Escape,” “Hell Boats,” and “Submarine X-1.” These movies ranked as half-baked epics with neither a shred of atmosphere nor credibility. Sagal has to stage several shots on a studio set, principally the drive in the country that Quint and Beth take in his red roadster to see Scotty’s bereaved parents has our stars seated in an automobile mock-up with scenery back projected behind them. Sagal generates neither suspense nor sense of urgency. The cast walk through their roles like automatons delivering uninspired dialogue written by Sanford who went on to write the equally lackluster “Midway” and Joyce Perry who wrote teleplays for juvenile television shows like “Land of the Lost.” McCallum gets the best line in the movie when Hufford asks him about the odds of the mission succeeding: “About the same as spitting in an Air Commodore's eye from an express train, sir.” In “Mosquito Squadron,” Suzanne Neve and McCallum never generate any chemistry so it is difficult to believe that they love each other. Mind you, it is always a pleasure to watch David McCallum act, but “Mosquito Squadron” gives him very little to do.

FILM REVIEW OF ''OBJECTIVE: BURMA'' (1945)

Warner Brothers encountered greater production problems on "Desperate Journey" director Raoul Walsh's "Objective, Burma" than any other battle front movie that the Burbank studio made during World War II. This lengthy--at 142 minutes--war film is grittier than usual and gets rather disillusioning near the end because our heroes are caught literally between a rock and a hard place.

Scenarist Alvah Bessie remembers the first time that producer Jerry Wald mentioned the idea for the film. According to Bessie, Wald called him into his office and said, "I was talking to some guys at my house last night, and they told me what a wonderful job the paratroops are doing in Burma." An hour after reading everything that the Warner Brothers Research Department had about combat in Burma, Bessie realized that it was "strictly a British operation." He told Wald, "Look, Jerry,
there are no American troops in Burma." Wald's response was, "So what? It's only a moving picture." Bessie argued that an American invasion of Burma would lay Warner Brothers open to ridicule of the worst kind. Dismissing Bessie's prediction, Wald said, "So, look, put in some British liaison officers and stop worrying." Everybody from the War Department, to the Production Code Administration, and the Office of War Information, warned the filmmakers about the controversy that they were causing, but the nonplussed Wald moved ahead with the production. Not surprisingly, Wald's cavalier treatment of the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations discredited "Objective, Burma," in Britain. British reaction was so virulently negative that Warner Brothers withdrew it from circulation after a week.

Including British liaison officers as well as a Jewish American lieutenant, Bessie wrote the script for this "A" picture's in 19 days. He observed "it was a good story, if you don't mind the fact that Burma was a British show and was not commanded by Errol Flynn." After Bessie penned the original story, Jack Warner told Wald to assign two other scribes, Randal MacDougall and Lester Cole, because in Warner's words, "Bessie can't write all the pictures in the studio." The studio hired Raoul Walsh to direct and production commenced May 1, 1944. Shooting did not conclude until August 26, 1944, and all of the filming took place in and around Burbank and Los Angeles.

"Objective, Burma" dealt with American paratroopers spearheading the invasion of Burma after the Japanese had chased General Joseph W. Stilwell (Erville Alderson of "Parachute Battalion") out of the country. An older American war correspondent, Mark Williams (Henry Hull of "High Sierra"), accompanies Captain Nelson (Errol Flynn of "Captain Blood") and his young paratroopers who drop behind enemy lines and demolish a radar station. Nelson's native guides spot Japanese troops on the march, so our heroes have to wave off two U.S.A.A.F. C-46 transport planes winging in to retrieve them. Since usable airfield exists between Nelson and Allied lines where the U.S.A.A.F. can land, the paratroopers must march 150 miles through enemy infested jungle. During the long arduous journey, Nelson divides his men into two sections. Nelson leads one section with Williams while the Jewish-American Lieutenant, Sid Jacobs (William Prince of "The Gauntlet")commands the other group. Eventually, Nelson's men link up with two survivors from Jacobs' ill-fated group. Nelson learns, to his horror, that the Japanese have captured and tortured Jacobs and his men and left him almost dead. Jacobs begs Nelson to kill him, but Nelson cannot bring himself to shoot his friend. He gives him a gun instead and lets Jacobs commit suicide. The horrified war correspondent surveys the carnage and rants that the Japanese should be wiped off the earth. At one point during production, Bessie sent a memo to Wald about this controversial scene and asked that the studio reinsert a line of his dialogue. According to the original Bessie script, Nelson said, "There's nothing especially Japanese about this . . . You'll find it wherever you find fascists. There are even people who call themselves Americans who'd do it, too."

Neither Jerry Wald nor Jack Warner re-inserted the additional line in the film as released, that Bessie had written for Nelson, and the subject never came up again, despite his protest. Meanwhile, after the grisly discovery of the tortured paratroopers, Nelson receives surprising orders that direct him to march in the opposite direction from Allied headquarters. Reluctantly, the men follow their orders while the USAAF airdrops them supplies. The remnants of Nelson's force
reach a barren hillside, dig themselves into foxholes, repel a sneaky, vicious Japanese night attack, and awaken the following morning to see gliders and
thousands of paratroopers in the skies. They witness the beginning of the Allied invasion of Burma.

In March 1944, Warner Brothers sent the War Department a copy of the "Objective, Burma" screenplay, along with a request for a technical adviser who had served with the paratroops in the Pacific Theater. The studio emphasized in its correspondence with the War Department that "Objective, Burma" would stress "the important work of the paratroopers in the Pacific Theater." Warner Brothers' Location Manager, William
Guthrie, contacted Army Colonel Curtis Mitchell and explained, "Rest assured no political angle as discussed between you and me will be brought into this picture. It will be strictly an all American affair with American personnel only. We welcome any suggestions Army would like injected." On March 11, 1944, Mitchell briefed Major General Alexander Surles about "the story of about 48 paratroopers dropped 200 miles behind the Japanese lines for the purpose of wiping out a radar station and some supply dumps." He explained that the filmmakers were "prepared to make any changes you suggest in order to keep away from any subject that might be embarrassing." Eventually, the War Department assigned Burma combat veteran Captain Charles Galbreath as technical adviser for the film production.

Warner Brothers wanted "Objective, Burma," to look as realistic as possible, especially regarding the troops. The studio requested 5 compasses, 12 infantry demolition kits without explosives, 160 D rations, 80 K rations, 2 Lister bags, 6 hand axes with covers, 4 wire cutters with covers, 24 M-1 rifles with bayonets and scabbards and 4 carbines with folding stocks. As it turns out, the cast wound up eating the rations, apparently to evoke more realism in their performances. The Army located most of the equipment, except the folding stock type carbine.

"Objective, Burma" is a first-rate combat actioneer that will make you sweat.

FILM REVIEW OF "RAMBO" (2007)

Writer & director Sylvester Stallone raises the bar for violent, bloodthirsty combat sequences in his third sequel to "First Blood" (1982), the original epic about ex-Green Beret warrior John Rambo's exploits. Moreover, "Rambo" (***1/2 out of ****) makes the rugged battle scenes in both director Ridley Scott's adrenaline-fueled "Black Hawk Down" and Steven Spielberg's bullet-riddled "Saving Private Ryan" look like pugnacious paint-ball-blasting tournaments. No, "Rambo" doesn't boast the production values or elaborate villains that he confronted in "Rambo: First Blood Part 2" of Rambo III." Indeed, there are fewer explosions, but the considerably ramped up violence and the vicious Burmese Army troops compensate for those shortcomings.

The scenes of carnage in "Rambo" are so intense and gory that you'll shudder with revulsion every time a bullet pulverizes somebody, including the hideously repugnant villains. If the first two Rambo movies, "First Blood" and "Rambo: First Blood, Part 2," served as referendums on the contentious Vietnam War, with "Rambo 3" skewering the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, then it should come as no surprise that "Rambo" four exposes the genocide raging for sixty years in Burma.

In fact, Stallone selected Burma, officially called the Union of Myanmar, as the setting because the conflict between the Burmese Army and the Karen ethnic minority qualifies as the world's longest civil war. Said Stallone in a recent "Movies On-Line" interview, "From the time I heard about it and began researching it, I though, 'If I could just combine the two—raising awareness of the Karen-Burmese civil war and giving the audience a good adventure story—that would be perfect.'" Art Monterastelli and Stallone co-scripted "Rambo" and it clocks in at about 80 lean, mean minutes with a 12 minute end credit roll. Essentially, it's like an extended "A-Team" episode with gallons of blood and gore and terrific computer generated special effects that heighten the realism of the battle sequences. Virtually, all of the weapons are genuine replicas if not the real thing loaded with blanks.

Mind you, twenty years has elapsed since hard-bodied, tight-lipped Rambo swapped lead with anybody. Nothing has changed. Although it's as predictable, straightforward, but solemn as previous Rambo actioneers, "Rambo" is also as old-fashioned as any of the 1942-1945 World War II Hollywood propaganda movies that justified U.S. intervention in a global war. Stallone appears a mite long in the tooth (he's 62-years old), but he looks like Samson in fatigues, with blood veins entwining his bulging forearms like giant pythons. Unlike his last movie "Rocky
Balboa" where he proudly displayed his muscular physique, Stallone doesn't shred his fatigues. Interestingly, he may be one of the few action heroes who refuses to rip his shirt to ribbons like the classic pulp fiction hero Doc Savage, the Man of Bronze, every time that he tangled with an adversary.

When we meet Rambo, he is living in northern Thailand, runs a longboat the River Salween, captures cobras for a side show, and does a little blacksmithing at a forge. Several human rights missionaries ask him to ferry them into nearby Burma so they can deliver medical supplies and services to destitute Karen villagers. Initially, the world-weary Rambo refuses, but one of the missionaries, Sarah (plain-Jane looking Julie Benz of Showtime's "Dexter"), convinces him to take them. The ride upriver evokes memories of director Francis Ford Coppola's classic "Apocalypse Now" with Marlon Brando. No sooner have the Christian missionaries reached a remote village and improved the quality of life than the evil soldiers arrive. They either kill or
enslave everybody. These scenes are extremely graphic. Afterward, Reverend Arthur March (Ken Howard of "Michael Clayton") who represents the missionaries approaches Rambo about taking a motley crew of mercenaries in to rescue Sarah and the survivors. The mercenaries have second thoughts when they learn that the Army outnumbers them ten-to-one. Rambo shames them into doing their job. Naturally, Rambo cannot pass up a good fight so he breaks out his bow & arrow. Later, he wields a .50 caliber machine gun with devastating results, mowing down well over seventy-five soldiers. Rambo's best line is: "Live for nothing, or die for something!" This line pretty much sums up the storyline. Richard Crenna briefly appears in a montage sequence as Colonel Trautman when Rambo ponders his fate. Talented "Exit Wounds" lenser Glen MacPherson photographed the action against authentic Thai backgrounds during torrential downpours of rain.

Happily, "Rambo" brings our hero full circle in what Stallone has said is the final "Rambo" film. If you missed this explosive movie during its theatrical run, the "Rambo" DVD is terrific with an informative audio commentary track by Stallone that takes you behind the scenes into the production of this epic war movie.