The first half of Rambo, Sylvester Stallone’s contemporary remake of his 1982 film about an ultraviolent action hero, deals with largely the same themes and motifs as Francis Coppola’s acclaimed Apocalypse Now—a trip up a jungle river into a mysterious and savage Asian place of violence and horror providing a means to contemplate the darkness in the human heart and what it takes to defeat it—and actually does so more effectively than Coppola’s film.

Yes, I mean that: the first half of Rambo is better than Apocalypse Now.

It’s nowhere near as arty, of course. Stallone, who directed this film, is a clever but not brilliant director. But the film’s treatment of the themes and ideas is superb, and it is definitely better than Coppola’s inventive but confused development of John Milius’s intelligent screenplay for Apocalypse Now.

The second half of Rambo is not for intellectuals, however. It is the bloodiest and most violent film I’ve seen in quite a while.

Nonetheless, the violence is neither distancing nor seductive. It is simply real. The backdrop of the story is from real life: the Burmese government’s brutal mistreatment of the nation’s Karen Christian minority. Rambo’s effort to rescue a group of American Christian missionaries kidnapped by government militia forces leads to the expected action-movie violence—in fact, a good deal more violence than expected, as the militia forces vastly outnumber Rambo and the small group of mercenaries involved in the rescue.

The violence endemic in Rambo is a vivid illustration of the concept of original sin, and Stallone surely must mean it so. One, for all his crudities as an actor, he is a truly smart filmmaker who knows very well what he is doing and why. Two, his most recent film prior to Rambo, the remake of Rocky, made evident Stallone’s intent to pursue Christian themes in his films at this time of his life.

Stallone forges Christian themes in Rambo just as relentlessly as the hero pursues the Burmese militia members who routinely murder, maim, rape, and torture the Karen Christian minority in the country, and who have kidnapped the American missionaries who bravely and rather recklessly traveled up the river to bring medicine and medical treatment to the refugees.

The initial sequences of the film show Rambo capturing dangerous snakes. The theological reference to serpents is not overly obvious and is very effective.

In addition, a couple of dialogue scenes tackle the issue directly.

For example, when the American missionaries try to persuade him to take them to the Karen refugee camp, Rambo derides them as foolish for thinking that they can change the world. His comments indicate the power and ubiquity of original sin. Ultimately, however, he comes to realize that the missionaries’ way is a central part of the solution to mankind’s ongoing violence and exploitation. Likewise, the missionaries come to realize that Rambo’s way is also an important element of the answer.

If the film concentrates rather strongly on the latter, the practical need for protectors and warriors in a sinful world, it certainly gives sufficient attention and respect to
the equally powerful need for forces of love, peace, and reconciliation. That’s rather more than the average action film is able to accomplish, and Stallone is to be commended for attempting it and largely succeeding.