Rambo III (1988) Review

"I'm no tourist."
-John Rambo



Now living in seclusion in Thailand, John Rambo (Sylvester Stallone) is approached once again by his old commanding officer, Colonel Sam Trautman (Richard Crenna), for help on a mission to war-torn Afghanistan.  Rambo refuses, but Trautman goes anyway and gets captured.  Rambo decides to go into Afghanistan to rescue his friend, but has to go up against the brutal Soviet Colonel Zaysen (Marc de Jonge).


What Works:

As to be expected, Rambo III has a bunch of action sequences and a couple of them are pretty solid.  I like Rambo and Trautman's escape from the base and the entire 3rd act is pretty fun.  We get one amazing moment where Rambo kills a guy by hanging him and blowing him up at the same time.

The final face off between Rambo and Zaysen is nothing short of amazing.  Rambo drives a tank, while Zaysen flies an attack helicopter.  The two of them drive headlong at each other, guns blazing, and drive straight into each other.  It's unbelievably awesome and the best moment of the movie.

Finally, I do like that we get Trautman out in the field this time around.  He's been on the sideline for two movies, it's about time he got in the game.


What Sucks:

Speaking of Trautman, I was really annoyed with him at the beginning of the movie.  He has the audacity to ask Rambo to go on this mission after everything he's gone through?  Trautman is a bad friend, that's for sure.

I got really excited when I saw Kurtwood Smith's name in the credits.  I was hoping he'd end up being a secret bad guy or something.  I would have loved to see Rambo vs. Red Foreman.  Unfortunately, he has about three scenes and doesn't really do anything.

The Mujahideen storyline is really dull and none of the characters we meet are interesting in the slightest.  It just feels like a bunch of filler while we get to the action.  I will say, this movie has aged...strangely with how the film treats the Afghan soldiers vs. how they are viewed today.  It's an interesting time capsule of a movie, but that doesn't stop these characters from being boring.

Finally, it takes way too long to get into the action and a lot of what we do get isn't great.  The initial attack on the Mujahideen base is dull and the fight in the cave is stupid.  Not only do the explosion effects look bad, but it doesn't make a ton of sense.  Wouldn't it be smarter to shoot the Soviets as they repel into the cave instead of waiting for them to get their bearings at the bottom?


Verdict:

While there are a couple of fun moments in Rambo III and it is nice to see Trautman in the fight, most of this movie is boring.  It takes way too long to get into the action and when we do, it isn't as good as what we've seen before.  I don't think the desert terrain lends itself to the series as well as the forest or the jungle.  Kurtwood Smith is underused and Trautman asking Rambo to go on the mission in the first place rubbed me the wrong way.  This one isn't worth your time.

 3/10: Really Bad    

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