Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985)

John Rambo is released from prison by the government for a top-secret covert mission to the last place on Earth he'd want to return - the jungles of Vietnam.

Director:

George P. Cosmatos

Writers:

David Morrell (based on characters created by), Kevin Jarre (story by)

Stars:

Sylvester Stallone, Richard Crenna, Charles Napier

Nominated for 1 Oscar. Another 5 wins & 4 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Sylvester Stallone	...	Rambo
Richard Crenna	...	Trautman
Charles Napier	...	Murdock
Steven Berkoff	...	Podovsky
Julia Nickson	...	Co
Martin Kove	...	Ericson
George Cheung	...	Tay (as George Kee Cheung)
Andy Wood	...	Banks
William Ghent	...	Vinh
Voyo Goric	...	Yushin (as Vojo Goric)
Dana Lee	...	Kinh
Baoan Coleman	...	Gunboat Captain
Steve Williams	...	Lifer
Don Collins	...	P.O.W. #1
Christopher Grant	...	P.O.W. #2

Storyline

John Rambo is removed from prison by his former superior, Colonel Samuel Troutman, for a top-secret operation to bring back POW's still held in Vietnam. Rambo's assignment is to only take pictures of where the POWs are being held, but Rambo wants to get the POWs out of Vietnam. Teamed up with female Vietnamese freedom fighter Co Bao, Rambo embarks on a mission to rescue the POWs, who are being held by sadistic Vietnamese Captain Vinh and his Russian comrade, Lieutenant Colonel Padovsky. Rambo starts killing every enemy in sight while still focusing on his intentions to rescue the POWs. There are also corrupt American officials involved in the mission, including Marshall Murdock, one of Rambo's superiors.

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Plot Keywords:

1980s | navajo indian | arizona | reference to bowie arizona | reference to arizona | 

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Taglines:

No man, no law, no war can stop him.

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Thriller | War

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Certificate:

R

Details

Official Sites:

Instagram

Country:

USA Mexico

Language:

English Vietnamese Russian

Release Date:

22 May 1985 (USA)

Also Known As:

Rambo

Filming Locations:

Sierra Madre del Sur de Oaxaca, Mexico

Box Office

Budget:

$44,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$25,520,843, 27 May 1985

Gross USA:

$150,415,432

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$300,400,432

Company Credits

Production Co:

Estudios Churubusco Azteca S.A., Anabasis N.V.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

96 min

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) Dolby Stereo (35 mm prints) (4 channels)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

In the opening scene when Col. Trautman visits Rambo in prison and talks to him about the mission, he says to Rambo "You can't possibly want to stay here another 5 years." After the ending of the previous movie which took place in December 1981, John Rambo was tried and convicted for his rampage in Hope. Rambo's trial and imprisoned had occurred sometime in early 1982. This would mean at the beginning of the movie, Rambo would had been in prison for 4 years and he wouldn't be due to release until 1990 and this means he was sentenced to 8 years for property destruction, grievous bodily harm, assault of police officers, attempted murder of a police officer and the direct murder of a police officer.

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Goofs

When Rambo is preparing his weapons on the helicopter, he has a case of four explosive arrowheads. Throughout the movie he fires five.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Prisoner guard: Let's keep those hammers working!

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Alternate Versions

Gaurav Arts, the film's distributor in India, had cut some of the most violent shots in the film in 1985 in order to receive an 'Adults Only' rating from India's censors board. Among the scenes trimmed were Rambo being tortured in the leech-infested water, Rambo being tortured through electrocution, Rambo's attack on both Podovsky and Vinh's men near the end etc. The cuts were finally restored in 1993 when the film was submitted to be re-rated by India's censors board.

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Connections

Featured in Honest Trailers: Die Hard (2015)

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Soundtracks

Peace in Our Life
Title Song
© 1985 Anabasis Music (BMI) and Elcajo Productions, Inc. (BMI)
Music by Frank Stallone, Peter Schless, Jerry Goldsmith
Lyrics by Frank Stallone
Sung by Frank Stallone

User Reviews

This film is more real than you think

Although done in the way of a mindless action film, this movie is steeped more in reality than you might think. It's true that there are hundreds of leftover POW's still alive in Vietnam. Many of them however have been moved over to Laos, Cambodia, North Korea, and the former Soviet Union. In the early eighties, Ronald Reagan tried to establish two rescue missions but stopped them at the last minute because their rescue would bring up a secret war the U.S. fought in Laos in the late sixties and early seventies. Many U.S. MIA's/POW's are from this secret war that no one was supposed to know about. Anyway, rather than try rescuing them, they felt that by "liquidating the merchandise" i.e. killing the POW's, the U.S. government could avoid embarrassment and let the pain of Vietnam die off. In fact, Vietnam did offer a number of live POW's to Reagan his first week of office for $ 4 billion dollars but they rejected this offer and continue to claim there are no more live POW's there, even though they have been tracking them by satellite for decades. What makes Rambo so disturbing is, this movie made $ 150 million at the box office, and Reagan even referenced it in a speech he gave once, yet no one in the media reports on the topic anymore. They instead look at it like they do the movie, simply a fantasy.