Sylvester Stallone and His Friends' Films Podcast

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welcome to it's a long road the ramble series podcast I'm your host Ryan and
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with me today I have a very special guest John from across the pond no that wasn't meant to rhyme but that's what
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just happened there as I said it John reached out to me via email and he says hey do you want me to come on and talk
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about Rambo he says that he might have some interesting insight about ramble John ramble his character the psychology
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or how maybe Veterans of traumatic experiences or even non-veterans of
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traumatic experiences might act in some of these situations he says he might have some interest Insight he didn't
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tell me what the Insight would be but I suspect it would be very interesting John how are you doing yeah good thank
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you that was a good introduction I'm not sure I live up to it but yeah I'm interested in the character and hopefully I can say some things about
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the character from a psychology point of view to be fair I was introduced to the Rambo films when I was studying at
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University a friend of mine bill I was a big fan you might even say obsessed by the uh the films and then I
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started watching them and I found them quite interesting character betrayals and I got more and more hooked into the
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franchise I guess at the time I was also studying films so it's kind of interesting just thinking of it through
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that lens but I've been listening to your podcast so far and found them quite
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insightful and entertaining and uh engaging so I was quite Keen to get involved and maybe say a few things add
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some layers of Interest that's already been on Earth so far well it's very kind of you well I appreciate that I
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appreciate you reaching out to me via email if anyone else wants to reach out to me via email we haven't got any emails really recently which is which is
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fine I mean I'm not gonna cry about it but it's you know I kind of missed the early chat at the beginning of the seasons and it sort of stopped the
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numbers have gone up people are enjoying the show but I guess nobody really has anything to say but if you want to come and say hi check out the show notes I
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don't have this email memorized I think it's ramble series podcast gmail.com but check out the show notes for
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verification you send me email I said hey I'd like to come on the show and I've had people this is not a defense to
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you John but I've had people reach out to me before with my Rocky podcast throughout the years and they're like oh
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I want to come on and they just kind of come on they just say like oh I want to come on and crack wise or whatever or
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say this or say that as often as people that don't listen to the shows and I don't really necessarily like that
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because they just want to plug themselves or like I just want to come on your show and but I knew that you were a listener which is good but you're
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also the first certainly for the Ramble podcast you're the first person with some sort of educational background
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regarding the brain how people think you know you've studied this and I've dabbled in Psychology I find it
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fascinating I did some time in University with psychology I did some bioscience and philosophy and things
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like that and I love how the brain thinks or how we think or anyways there's a whole other discussion I could
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create a whole podcast on just how we think as humans the whole psyche is just fascinating to me so my next question to
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you at the time was you know do you know how to talk on a microphone because I don't know who you are you know you come on the microphone and you're like uh you
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look good you sound good so I'm happy before we get into well before we get into some of the discussion of Rambo's
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background as you see it how somebody like him would think or act tell me you're fandom of Rambo of the film first
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butt and specifically of course now because we're in season two of The of this recording uh you're fandom of First
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Blood Part Two I guess it came from initially seeing part one actually at the time how old would I have been I
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think well actually I can remember specifically because I saw the film on my 14th birthday and it was a 15 so I
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saw a year too early if you like and um us and Canadian listeners uh you're
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just saying that the ratings here are like PG-13 or rated R but you have like
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15 I guess is the age number there for days I actually seem to recall I was down the end of my road I guess just
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hanging out with some friends uh a few of them a little bit older and they'd seen this film and they were talking
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about it in all really uh they were just kind of going through different scenes and just describing they'd never seen
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anything quite like it according to their description so I got increasingly curious so I knew about the first film
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as well so I thought well this would be a good thing to go and see but then it was a 15 so it was my birthday and I was
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living with my mother at the time and I convinced her it might be a good idea we were going to see it so she took me
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along happily I don't know but she took me along and we watched it we didn't say very much about the film at the end
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because I didn't really know how to relate to my mother what we just seen so the thing we talked about on the way
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back in the car was the cinematography he said oh it was amazing I think we were talking about the shot of the
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helicopter coming into uh the foreground the sun in the background and that kind of thing anyway my mum comment on those
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things but I don't think she had much interest in the wider film but that was my introduction to it and that's partly
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how it came about so yeah I was 14 years old oh nice okay so that was part two
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was part two yeah okay I don't want to ask necessary how old you are but I think you're probably younger than me
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um I could guess 36 35. oh wow I'm 50. what you're being very generous
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okay well good for you well I was trying to gauge your age by the time because who you're seeing when the movie came
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out so you're a few years old to me okay great that's fantastic so that's that's fantastic good for you did you see you sorry did you see part two first then
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because a lot of people did see part two first thought of me that's thinking I must have seen part one maybe would it
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have been on television at that time so there's some confusion about whether two took me back to one or one I had some
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snippet and understanding of well maybe you could offer some insight because this question I kind of have is I don't
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know in your studies is there any real connection between violent events and media like first example if I had the
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tendency to be a violent person let's say violent movies already exist do movies really make me violent do they
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cortical give me permission because my head's already not screwed on right if I want to do a mass shooting for example
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like I'm not thinking like my average person my average family member my average neighbor the average person in
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the store like the average person goes about their day not killing people that's just you know a shooting is a
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mass shooting or school shooting or Store shooting or whatever those shootings are that happen in the states of course recently people that do those
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aren't your quote-unquote normal functioning Mental Health Green type
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people so what I'm getting at is these movies already exist and exist on a scale where millions and millions of
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people or video games are playing and watch these things if video games I don't mean to lead the witness sir but
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if video games and movies LED people to Violent actions why don't we have millions of these things and do they
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really Inspire kids or people to create violent things or were they good that's
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going to do it anyways I.E Hitler was just Hitler and he didn't play any video games so I I know I kind of LED my how I
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feel about it but I'm curious is there any real evidence on your end in the Science World that these things could
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make someone who would never be violent be violent well you conclude I suppose if I pick up at that point somebody who
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would never be violent be violent is difficult to answer that one necessarily but if I just kind of go to your wider
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question you get research from both sides and we often hear it depends I I
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guess there's also some interest in who funds This research of course but you you'll often hear there is no link and
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this gets reported with reasonable regularity prosperous media outlets and you whether they have an interest in
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saying that or not are not kind of particularly overly questioning that but reasonably regularly we hear this not
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but also there is plenty of studies that say there indeed is a connection it
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feels to me reasonable to suggest there has to be some connection but it doesn't feel that there certainly means people
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who watch it are going to turn to violence but maybe certain ideas are born out of watching certain things
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which may be widens some companies considerations in the negative of what they might do perhaps you might say it
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legitimizes in certain ways certain actions and behaviors and I know that's been pushed against gaming for some time
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I'm going to be cautious about saying precisely the connection or not but I will say it feels reasonable to suggest
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there's some connection that doesn't mean to say it scales up in the way in which you were suggesting is going to
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turn people violent who aren't necessarily uh angling in that direction that's kind of what I led to with my
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Layman brain was just that if somebody already had the inclination in their DNA to be of cortical
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on a mass scale or even on a private scale a violent person and they saw the behavior of what they thought about in
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their brain saw it on a on TV or in a movie or a video game that idea that hey if they can create this kind of imagery
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why can't I just do it as well type excuse I don't know if there's any kind of term for this in Psychology or or
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Neuroscience but the idea that unbeknownst to maybe me I already have the inclination to be a violent person
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and so if I see a plate out on stage in the yester years or on screen today or
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video games today that in a weird way gives me that permission to act out my fantasies I I
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find that fascinating but the same time I wonder still if that person is already who they are and by seeing this the same
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thing that makes you my own person also doesn't make you think clearly if that makes sense you're not thinking rationally if all it takes is a video
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game to kind of move you into the direction of a violent Mass Act I'm less attuned to the sort of
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intrinsic DNA kind of argument you you were putting forward there I I suppose
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more I I'm interested in the malleability of the human brain the ways
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in which I suppose our environment can shape us when you talk about DNA I guess really we're talking about a nature
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nurture argument here right I'm more attuned really to the malleability of the human brain I tend not to
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pathologize so much and have this idea of sort of this is going to come out as a fixed way of being which is just I
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suppose set at the point of birth for some individual I can therefore sort of imagine how environments exposure plays
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a role in how we sort of consider ourselves in the world and how we act within it
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think can be a little bit limited just to sort of have this consideration of somebody had this propensity and they
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were going to do this anyway I'm more interested in terms of the way in which our environments might shape us I'm of
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the same mind of nature nurture absolutely you can't obviously the Rhine that is the DNA Ryan that exists right
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now you put me in a wholly completely different environment in my formative years this same DNA right now wouldn't
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be who I am today maybe to a large extent I'm not sure I have children I'm not sure if you have children but I have kids and of course if if I was just to
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like physically abuse my children daily I can't imagine they'd be the who they are today if I did it for years of
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course there has to be some sort of connection between one's environment their culture religion
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education nurturing love not love whatever all the flip side of everything
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I just said like yeah it's going to form I'm not a professional in any of this way but I've always viewed that we don't
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come out necessarily all the same lump of clay there's something in our DNA that is with us the moment we kind of
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plop into this world I don't mean to be crass but just what we exist into this world there's something that's already
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in me that nurturing will the malleable the malleability effect that you're
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talking about yes but there's things in me that no matter how much you massage it you'll never get out of me no matter how much you massage me like I.E I try
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to play guitar okay when I was a kid I'm a huge rock and roll guy I'm in I love the hair Rock and the metal Rock when I
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grew up and I want to of course be like my rock gods you know these guys are playing guitar I want to be guitarist I
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picked up guitar took lessons and now you could say well Ryan anything you put your mind to you can do like I don't
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know if I necessarily believe that I tried so hard my DNA in me just didn't allow me to play like slash and Angus
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Young like I just no matter how much I tried I didn't have it in me and I recognized oh I think I'm just a lover
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of music I love the music and I'm just a lover of music but I can't create it even if I could play it technically I
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don't even know if I had it in me to create a song so even if I knew how to play it mechanically did I have the
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Romantic side of music was I able to create the sounds because a lot of people you sit on YouTube all the time
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people like covering Metallica or uh AC DC that's great I admire when I see
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people cover and some people like also very hard how to to play like Eddie Van Halen and I'm always like no no no no no
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that's the difference there's the point is the DNA is yes you can play like Eddie like you can play the same notes
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he played but can you create his songs he created The Sounds uh onto the
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discussion now of John Rambo and his psyche so when you emailed me you felt
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like obviously at the time when you emailed me that you might have something to say regarding John Rambo and the way he thinks or
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operates in these environments and his wartime experience uh what is it about reaching out to me that you wanted to
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share regarding Rambo well perhaps some of that would come out as we're watching the film and maybe when we're thinking
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about particular moments or expressions or ways of being absolutely we can think about why he's operating in that
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particular fashion but I guess something you've talked about somewhat already actually in part one I think mostly and
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probably largely so at the end of the film when he has a breakdown of souls when he's with Troutman and he's
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surrounded there's much discussion around PTSD here this is something he's accrued during his time in Vietnam I
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guess is what we're exploring I'm thinking about the way in which she's in certain environments I guess will be
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adrenalized kicking in that fight or flight response and operating in a certain way which is quite defensive in
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simple terms here I guess staying alive but I guess the opposite of that is what
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we see at the end of part one when you see his fragility as vulnerability where
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he's no longer defending against certain ways of being if you like he's not in that defensive mode and so he's
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tolerating the vulnerability and he's expressing that and that's quite a powerful moment in that film and there's some kind of moments also
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and I think in in part two we see some of that fragility too or that vulnerability and I think in the scene
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it will come up when he meets the lady who's his guide when he's dropped into or Behind Enemy Lines if you get her
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name in the film okay Cole without perhaps saying what happens because I think that will come up in a time where
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running through the various rushes we'll be looking at you see sort of a moment of vulnerability there too and so I'm
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interested in those two sides of the character that defended that adrenalized person but also that vulnerable place
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and how that vulnerability is defended against the episode before this one John we actually discussed the coal and
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ramble moment on the boat when Cole says Rebel you're not Expendable and ramble was sharing his feelings so do you want
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to speak to that moment in the film and maybe how that was the most vulnerable with our softest we've ever
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seen ramble why that might have been that there was this moment as you've just highlighted Ryan on the boat when
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there's this discussion of uh Rambo being expandable a self-effacing way he highlights um I think I think he says
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something about when you go to a party or you're invited to a party you don't show but nobody really cares
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and that's his definition of that uh particular phrase what do you think of that word what do you think of that analogy that he used I thought it was a
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pretty smart analogy I feel it's got a certain poignancy hasn't it it cuts through when he says that and you feel
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that and and I guess in that moment when he's expressing his vulnerability by
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saying that you kind of warm to the character invites you in it's those times where he's not pushing away and so
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there's something very alluring about that I guess and when people are be able or when people are able to get behind
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their defenses and show who they are it is something that really does like say pull others in and I guess when you're
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watching the film that's why you have a certain Connection in that moment coming up in what we'll be uh watching today is
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also the tragic scene where this lady comb who I suppose used building
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relationship with in different ways shortly after her declaration or his
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declaration that they're going to go to America together which she requests and I guess they're falling in love for
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these few moments in time she's then taken from him she's shot within seconds later after that scene
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and so you see this tremendous vulnerability in the character and then you see his aggression straight after
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when he's shooting those and you might see understandably so who've just shot the person he's likely to spend the rest
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of his life with you but those are the kind of the moments that capture my interest with this character okay all
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right well if yeah we'll just roll right into it so where we left off now is Rambo and Cole or are now being dropped
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off like so kind of behind the Enemy Lines or closer to where ramble was officially supposed to take pictures of
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course he doesn't have a camera anymore so I guess maybe he'll just draw something I don't know he's he's getting dropped off now where the prison of Wars
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may or may not be so they reached the camp the semi-looking like
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shanty town of a village where of course the music score has changed that they're in a dangerous area or this might be a
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dangerous part coming up for them but they've reached the area where the prisoner Wars may or may not be point of Interest I don't know if it came up in
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one of your other discussions but just looking at the scenery the backdrop as well as you're talking about the music
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school there I understand this was filmed in Mexico interestingly of course Rambo part 5 is in Mexico but I think
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that was filmed in the Canary Islands so I gather so um yeah so just a curiosity that the
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Mexico one wasn't filmed in Mexico but this one was although it's uh supposed to be Vietnam as it were yes that's
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right I didn't know it was filmed in Mexico either until I started doing this season I just never researched that much
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but I guess that kind of makes sense but it looks great like I don't know what jungles look like really anywhere
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outside of where I live and I don't live in a jungle but I guess the Mexican jungle it really passes for what I would
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think a Vietnam jungle looks like it looks very vietnam-ish I know it sounds terrible but all the Vietnam films I've seen this looks just as well as any
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other place yeah for my limited knowledge these Landscapes I wouldn't have necessarily known it was replaced
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and filmed in a different country but there are a few moments so maybe we'll see them where actually it does look
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like they're on a film set as well and so something changes but I can't quite remember where those are but they'll
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perhaps pop up as we're going through but otherwise it's a pretty convincing set yeah there's something really neat
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and aesthetic about the 80s and 90s before CGI kind of our backdrops took
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over where the Aesthetics are just the real land I just really like how the
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real foliage just looks better than fake foliage you know it just feels better I think the actors kind of take that
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environment into the sense of danger around the real insects and what have you that are around the actors during these films that you don't get on a
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sounds yeah that's a really interesting point actually just thinking about using real Landscapes to land as opposed to
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CGI I guess that says something about the character as well doesn't it of Rambo because when he's in the
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operational room before he's flown in or flown in behind enemy line you see all this high-tech equipment and I think he
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says the mind is the best weapon and there's something very earthy about that there's certainly very human he's close
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to the land he's not kind of been taken away by all this high-tech stuff and I guess not having a CGI background it
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being very grounded in that way so something about the character as well
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so I always find it interesting that she did believe the camp wasn't like she's been around this area whoever was hiding
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these prisoners did a fairly good job that she is a local and a spy she hasn't seen any prisoners yet herself
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yeah it's fair point they do comment slightly later in the film or the pow that he temporarily releases before
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they're recaptured he does mention they're moved around a lot and I think he says we've only just come back to
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this camp in perhaps recent days or weeks there's a good chance she could have seen that camp empty for quite some time and we have a scene here where
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we've gotten close to the camp is definitely armed soldiers here and I love how they have a uh prostitute has
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come to the camp and she's on a little moped or whatever and she knows where to go so I love wherever she has come from
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it's moped friendly okay like the trail or you know from her
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like I don't know wherever she lives or wherever she works out of and she's living she's all dolled up and you think
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she's got to be nervous like oh yeah I'm just gonna go to this camp with a bunch of men and I'm by myself oh this is such a you know like she's delivering pizza
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the way she's acting she seems to be very casual I imagine terrifying yeah
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[Music]
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I love how Rambles putting together his bow and arrow right there the guard was only like 20 feet away is this the first
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time we see his bow and arrow yes other than him getting it ready to go in the airplane yeah we haven't seen him use it
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yet that's right this uh throughout the film this becomes kind of his weapon of choice really you may have discussed
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this with Dave and rail he wrote the novelization I think for part two in part three I think he dedicates chapter
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to archery I have Red Bull Parts two and three when I was a teenager but I haven't reread them as an adult I read
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part one as an adult of course before I interviewed David because I want to have all that fresh in my head it is
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mentioned in part one it's our first Blood the novel so before all the films that John ramble was a Bozeman that was
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something that he did do so it's actually mentioned I think he kills and or does something with the bow in the first Blood I found a nice little nod to
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the Future character that it wasn't a Stallone creation because still only does like do um you know obviously the
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ramble character like Stallone has I what's a word to look for made the character Immortal on screen that's what
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he's doing the Genesis of the bow was actually in the book as well somewhere in the book but he talks about the spiritual side of kind of archery as it
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were and just also thinking this Buddhist connection as well what's going on in the film as well and so there's
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sort of Zen archery and this kind of thing no bow no sound he says especially if you say no Ko No bow okay stupid my
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Stupid humor I apologize you're not going in there
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and I thought you're supposed to need to take pictures what about orders
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no more let's go I love that no more orders Cole You've got the um speed show
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up on uh sorry you've got subtitles up actually a lot of what this I haven't heard this the first time around it is a
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bit like in the um blood one there's this little incidental kind of lines which happening when it was going down
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into the prison cells when they're talking to the chap who's painting the rooms down there I forget his name now be right that's right but it's quite
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interesting seeing the uh the words this time I'm picking up on things that are new to me let me plug closed captions
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called closed captioning on many of your devices this is It's the CC or subtitles I don't watch any movies they don't have
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closed captions I rarely go to the theater because I rely on closed captioning that much because of what you just said there's so much dialogue that
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people don't catch because we are visual creatures and audio creatures obviously but there's times where we're watching
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the visual we're not really paying attention to what they're saying because we might think it's a I don't know what our brains do it just decides I'm not
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going to pay attention to the audio or it doesn't come through very clear but no I absolutely love closed caption but
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you catch little moments like that little pieces of dialogue that yeah you don't brain doesn't registers but I think your brain registers dialogue
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obviously better when you're reading it I don't know why that is but when you read the words quick side note the reason why I started doing a closed
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captioning is when my kids were young I couldn't hear the dialogue on the TV like they didn't know the kids are playing in the living room so I wanted to tell my kids to hey shut up I'm
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watching TV a little you know I turn on the closed captioning so I could hear or read the dialogue you know throughout oh
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okay so ever since then I've been hooked anyways that's my little story why I got hooked on closed captioning well I'm
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suddenly getting into it now well I find a lot of people once they get into closed captioning they're like me they're not hard of hearing they just
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like not missing any of the dialogue it's not like we're indulging dialogue
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in these films it's yeah
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yeah so what I love here is we're seeing a ramble using this knife you know his knife the serrated edge of his knife is
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breaking up with the barbed wire he's put together his bow it's night time now no more orders no pitchers Rambo's just
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going into this Camp not guns ablazing necessarily but just metaphorically speaking Yeah and I suppose they're
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using the knife here as well because if you look at the Reflection In The Moonlight that's the thing that stands out it's like a Michael Jackson's
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glitter socks that's uh Rambo's kind of uh thing that you know where he is yeah that's hilarious good job
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MJ rest in peace [Music]
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I always love how these movies that there's always so many guards they do have some pow guys here all these pows
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are not armed or nothing they're all like malnourished have no strength but they have so much armed guards around
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these prisoners like each one of them's worth a million dollars but this is for the effect of movies I understand that it also allows Rambo to achieve his body
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count I guess so ravel's now deep into the camp and he's you know running around and he's
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got his bow in his right hand he's using the Shadows of the trees and shrubs and again showcasing just how good of a
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soldier he is that he's able to get this deep into the camp and not be spotted here a couple near misses but he's able
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to go very deep into the camp you know we had that conversation about whether on a film set whether in the jungle
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these are the parts I suppose are more in a film set now I agree yeah yeah with the that's right I totally agree with
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Rambo jumping around those bushes in the in the makeshift Village and what have you yeah this would be Sound Stage stuff
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absolutely so now Rambo is looking underneath the floorboards of the the [ __ ] from the village and and when the
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army men having a couple drinks and he looked underneath I wonder how long he stayed underneath the watch no anyways
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he took off pretty quickly all right so we can't attribute that kind of behavior to Rambo no no he's not a Peeping Tom so
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yeah soldiers are walking around you know talking chattering on their ships what do you expect from a v any kind of
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camp where there's guards around but it's a very busy very busy little camp and yeah I think that shot there uh John
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is is soundstage here what do you think I don't know it's tough to say there's a lot of foliage there I don't know so are you debating whether we're in a studio
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now and it's just the way it's lit yeah I don't know yeah a lot of ramble just running around giving the audience a
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sense of danger he's in the thick of her he's in The Hornet's Nest so he's gone deep you know he's not taking pictures
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but he's taking ramble pitchers in his mind trying to figure out where where because he knows he's not an idiot
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they're soldiers why are all these guards here why do we have all these guards what are they guarding if there's nothing here why is this place
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established it's so established that yes we have the prostitutes from the village come to visit this place there's guards
26:36
with guns so something's got to be here so he's trying to find out what it is and now he's just seeing a makeshift
26:42
jail like cage made out of bamboo so he's gonna go towards that now he's like ah bingo I know he's going in under
26:49
Darkness so he's not seen but I guess it also sets a kind of a tone for this the dark energy this Camp what's going on in
26:56
this place yeah so here's some groaning of men
27:02
[Applause] [Music] [Applause] we always find it crazy when they will
27:08
see these actors how thin they are they're like we need some Thin actors for this film yeah yeah I didn't say a method actors
27:16
and put the effort into not eat for a while or whether they just found people who are ready for the role
27:28
so Rambles look into the cage he sees rats crawling around spiders on them and
27:34
people shivering because they're cold and malnourished and sick with the flu who knows what right you know they're
27:40
probably lying and they're all pretty desperate side yeah so Rambo knows now that they're there so now he leaves them
27:46
though he doesn't want to alert them he goes back through the Waterway so you're thinking yourself what is he going to do now that he knows that they're there and
27:53
then he sees a guy outside the cage hanging on the cross almost like in a crucifixion style and some bamboo on a
28:00
bamboo cross and of course Rambo has no choice but to uh release him it tells him not to talk that was probably a very
28:05
similar cross to what Rambo found himself on you see in his flashbacks in part one and so the thought of leaving
28:11
somebody in that position but she also knows very much about would um make perfect sense also yeah so he knows okay
28:17
I can't leave this guy here can't free the other guys out of the prison just yet I think he was probably trying to figure out what he could do probably to
28:23
eliminate the Army at this point in the meantime he saw this guy out in the open on the cross you're like no
28:29
you're coming down so he takes him off the cross tells him not to talk of course
28:34
[Applause] I always just find it interesting that
28:40
nobody was guarding that guy on the cross but it's okay yeah because you think there's enough
28:45
guns to uh they got the guards everywhere but where the prisoners are
28:53
[Music] this guy hears something the bushes turns on the spotlight looks around damn
29:00
oh mothers
29:07
so the prisoner tells them there are others and ramble's like I'll be back for them don't worry right now we gotta get you out of here so he starts leading
29:14
this poor pow out
29:19
huh [Music]
29:27
foreign was putting together his kit you know he
29:32
puts in those two little knives that go you know facing each other oh yes and I and I said at that record and say oh I
29:38
bet you were going to see this knife be used because of course they had to show so there he took it from his bootstrap the little mini knife and threw her
29:44
right at the guys I guess heart and it kills him instantly which I love the accuracy that rap was
29:49
able to throw that knife it's just funny because in real life like to be able to throw a knife with such force of velocity and accuracy to knock out a
29:55
guard silently in real life that knife was thrown at you it probably like yeah she's like ow hey whoa that kind of hurt
30:03
dude you know like you'd be yellied out and paid at the very least but I love how you just Falls silently there are no
30:08
instant death from that little blade it is kind of funny how people die so quickly with knife wounds because you
30:14
know like in those Crime Story stuff you hear all the time man stab 37 times you know still walks to the hospital but
30:19
this guy goes down with one little piercing certainly a master of his craft yes yeah well yeah he's ramble he doesn't miss man
30:27
foreign [Applause] [Music]
30:33
she's hiding too the heat is on as they say
30:39
[Applause] look what Jack's fly is here eh
30:45
his Physique in this film is amazing of course you've got Rambo you you've done the rocky films you've got Arnold
30:52
Schwarzenegger and we're really in the pair Now sort of muscularity and Cinema aren't we and so it's not by accident
30:58
he's not wearing a top this is kind of how you sell the films now he starts this film kind of wearing a shirt and
31:04
this and but as the movie progresses he gets more and more nude by the end of the film he's just naked it's really
31:09
weird but there's another thing I say about this is maybe going a little bit too uh suitable I don't know but we're
31:15
also around the time of post-modernism otherwise known as a paradigm of plasticity
31:21
and what we see here is a plasticity of people's bodies they're formed or over built except they no longer look real
31:27
they're kind of plastic these characters and it kind of fits the time or the pot we find ourselves in for us as teenagers
31:33
are you myself when these movies came out the Arnold films when these keyboard 80s and uh late 80s these were our
31:39
Marvel Hero guys so These Guys these guys weren't mutants in the sense that
31:44
they had super powers where it doesn't matter what your physique is you know if you're Captain America or even
31:50
Spider-Man you know has these Incredible strength but he's just a skinny kid but for us these were our Marvel heroes that
31:56
these were our Larger than Life characters that we recognize that these were more than human they were human on
32:02
screen but they were more than human this was these were our superheroes absolutely so I think when you look at it that way it might make sense for
32:09
maybe the kids today would look back oh that's silly and hot yeah but you're looking at a guy with laser eyes and
32:15
what have you for us these guys were super human but they're still human but yeah they were beyond what you and I
32:20
would ever be I heard their phrase before we heard films you had Invasion of the Body Snatchers and here and this
32:26
kind of type of film you got the invasion of the bodybuilders very true I love it
32:36
so ramble just took out a guy with his spotlight I can only assume that you wasted that arrow on that one guy because that
32:43
Spotlight might have been nearing where their EXO was so he took him out so now they're back at the uh house where the
32:49
uh the woman from the village is with the guy and I love how she's like hey come back inside here we're I think
32:54
we're to assume he's nude she tells him to come back inside the hut and make love to her again no I love coz a
33:00
character itself it's the 80s of course so cause she gets saved by Rambo I kind of wish we saw kodu more than just being
33:06
saved by Rambo but Soco is in there and she's about to get shot by this Vietnamese officer I can only imagine he
33:13
hesitated killing her because she was so pretty and that gave Rambo enough time to shoot that guy in the head with an
33:19
arrow classic I love that violence you know the arrow in the head you know we know he is a skilled Bozeman he can he
33:26
can shoot you wherever he wants but I love it it's like no I'm gonna get this guy in the head I think that I think that would be a fun hit
33:32
he definitely was aiming and it pierces the guy to the tree so the velocity there are so strong that goes through
33:38
the guy's Cranium pits his head to the tree and they get a little close-up classic 80s violence it's almost comical
33:44
now but it's just back then it was quite brutal oh man the arrow went through his head yeah yeah so now it's daylight guards
33:52
are doing their rounds and they're seeing dead bodies and they've raised the alarm so we're left to assume that ramble did a little stealth killings I
33:58
think he killed three or four guys without alerting anybody in the process so now it's daytime we've seen the uh
34:04
they've seen the kills now we're heading back to base camp here troutman's getting ready for the extraction team so
34:09
Murdoch said yeah fine Troutman you can go yeah we gave ramble 36 hours so if
34:15
you want to you can go pick up the guy sure sure this chap on the left uh you
34:20
can see on the screen now okay I think he was a policeman in the American Cup Series Cagney and Lacey was he in that I
34:28
don't I yeah I'm not familiar with Martin Coleman I understand he was other than of course she was on Karate Kid
34:33
okay Katie Lacy you said yeah you're right okay I never knew Mark
34:41
Colvin and I see interesting though you got two female leads at a time with a
34:47
wouldn't be many female leads I suppose in American cop shows and then if you contrast the system pretty much as
34:53
you've highlighted the women we've seen here prostitutes or Bo who sadly meets
34:58
her demise in this film and there's much written around the others just simply isn't a place for women in film men just
35:04
take open if they're there they're extras or they're gotten rid of in some way other films like Thelma and Louise kind of highlighting the ending of that
35:11
film there's no place effectively they drive off the cliff because they can't exist they can't have these strong women
35:16
yeah that's true Katie and Lacey was kind of revolutionary to have he had two female leads for a TV show but you're
35:22
right in this film here especially an action film us guys we don't want to see a woman kicking butt you know it's an amended kick butt they see the day type
35:28
thing and it is unfortunate but to size crack on credit though the fact they even had a female cohort with him in the
35:34
jungle and at the same time having that having Co there as we'll see soon it
35:39
opens ramble up a male counterpart would have been able to do
35:46
last one hour into extraction I hope for his sake we're not just wasting fuel
35:52
let's get moving
35:57
what a stupid thing to say I hope for his sake he's not just wasting fuel what what he's saying is if he's dead then
36:04
he's not there right so the fuels wasted because no one's there but either way it's not a waste of fuel you need to
36:10
verify his existence or not you either way the helicopters they need to do their part of the job their part of the
36:16
job is we will be there at the extraction point to come get you the only way to verify that is to go there
36:21
so it's never a waste of fuel you have to visually verify his existence or not either way they have to go back and say
36:26
we went there because they have to answer to people right they have to answer to those superiors yeah the mission failed we went there he wasn't
36:32
there what's Plan B so it's not a waste of fuel either way whether they exist or not it doesn't make sense it seems a
36:38
waste of fuel which is going to cost I didn't know how much it will cost about then but um earlier in the film they're talking
36:44
about I think multi-million dollar computers just for Rambo to kind of watch his kind of mission and yet he's
36:50
talking about wasting Fuel and rain I understand it's a plot device they're just showing how much they don't care
36:56
about Rambo but again indeed indeed so now the Vietnamese soldiers there's
37:03
so many I don't get why there's so many of these guys anyways they're all coming out of the uh literally the Woodworks
37:09
and hunting ramble the Escape pow and of course Co of course the pow is ill he's
37:14
sick he's weak he can't keep up with him they've stopped to rest for a little bit now the pow is going to uh talk a little
37:19
bit to Rambo
37:28
only been there a week it was the last time you were in that camp a year yeah what year is it Anyway
37:36
1985. [Music]
37:45
it's supposed to be we move around so they're smart they're smart I wonder why they're even
37:51
bothering me keeping them alive like it's it's a lot of work I wonder what they're is it just to see them suffer I'm not sure but Murdoch comments on it
37:58
later and so maybe I could just say this that there's a rationale for keeping the pows you know I'll just say Murdoch will
38:04
comment on this later in the film I can't quite remember but it will come up shortly yeah I can't remember either okay so here we go so uh yeah they moved
38:11
the uh the camps around for the Harvesters and what have you and I love how he says what year is it and rival
38:17
since 1985. we don't get Gears very often in any film like I don't think it's ever mentioned again in the ramble films at all who I know in films in
38:24
general they try not to say what year it is because it just ages any kind of film that much more but you can do that in this film because it is about the
38:29
Vietnam conflict to say what year it is what year did the Vietnam War end was it 79 officially or something like that
38:36
something like late 70s yeah I I don't know yeah but if you're right we're talking about six years in that case
38:42
they've been in this I think that's what they're showing you that he's been a prisoner of war for at least four to four to six years which it he shows the
38:48
face like oh my gosh I have been here maybe even longer like to him time is
38:54
almost irrelevant right so yeah now we see the helicopter coming in trailman's checking his watch make sure they make
39:00
the Point Landing Point okay Rambles now carrying the pow over his shoulders
39:05
because they've got to make time so now he's just gonna carry the guy makes sense they're still traveling through
39:10
the woods or the jungle while the Vietnamese are closing in on them and the Vietnamese Captain is I like how
39:16
they came kind of show that he's not a totally idiot Captain like he's leaving them pretty good here so this Captain will come to play later of course so
39:22
he's a competent type leader he's telling a soldiers go this way come this way this is where they are so right
39:28
now Rambo the prisoner and Co are on the boat so they've made it to the pirates boat they're on the boat now with the Pirates
39:34
making some Headway on the river with with the Pirates and then we cut to uh Murdoch you know back in Command Center
39:41
looking at the computer screen view but of course I don't think he's really looking because he cares I think I think he's oddly nervous that they do find him
39:48
they do find Rambo he's you already get that sense like ugh I really hope they
39:54
don't find Rambo there's a look of uncomfortability about him he's sweating he doesn't look terribly good so the
39:59
Vietnamese soldiers get to the riverbank the captain calls in and says hey they've taken off they're on this Riverboat like I said this guy's very
40:06
competent which I like they show that this guy is not as slouch in his own right he calls in the make and look of
40:11
the of the boat they're on on the river now Rambo Coe and the Prisoner I don't know if we ever get his name but they're
40:17
in the kind of cabin of the boat and they're about to have a conversation here we were talking about him not having a shirt not he's going to shut
40:24
back home talking about um muscularity in cinnamon he's got his shirt back on here I don't quite know
40:30
how that's come about I think if we go back his shirt was on inside the jungle it's just it was it was always it just
40:37
always exposed his arms he wasn't completely shirtless in that nighttime yeah okay do you see this other boat
40:42
coming to the Pirates but now the Pirates have turned their weapons on to Rambo and the crew they have been double
40:49
crossed they've been double crossed you can't trust the pirate John what just happened that's that's often been the
40:56
case we've been sold out he says best
41:03
I love all the good pirate Captain back has rival's face you hear that slap and then rabble barely turns his head and
41:10
looks back at him like dude again boy do it again yeah you can't just [ __ ] slap
41:15
ramble he's not gonna feel that come on
41:27
oh this is um weapons oh yes the little mini weapons have come out again I think
41:32
those are the side weapons on my bad the knife that he killed the other Soldier was was just a small knife but these are the these were the mini little knives
41:38
that he's now pulled out the back side of his belt Rambo's now starting to stab the pirate crew with these little mini knifes
41:47
foreign
42:04
to the pirate scene you see in Rambo part four is it really yeah same idea that close quarter combat quick kills
42:11
great little action sequence there rabbit takes them with the shotgun he uses the weapons that are random dispatches of the pirate crew and now
42:18
the uh Vietnamese Patrol holds is coming towards Rambo and his gang though so
42:23
they're not out of the woods yet excuse the pun um I fight
42:34
[Music]
42:40
foreign so number one I I just want to mention that because I love every time that musical cue kicks in I use it for the
42:46
beginning of my episodes I love that Musical theme the juju sound that dangerous sound or that menacing sound
42:52
that Jerry Goldsmith creates for the Rambo character he's told Koh when the pow to jump out of the Riverboat because
42:57
it's going to be fired upon and it's just easy for Rambo to fight on his own so they jump into the water to safety
43:03
and freedom and Rambo remains on the boat while the Vietnamese Patrol boat just lays waste with just fires into
43:11
that boat like crazy trying to kill this American just unbelievable because it must be about a thousand rounds going to
43:16
this boat and not one touches him I mean I know he's lying down but nevertheless is is quite fat isn't it well if you're
43:22
ever fired upon by an M60 my advice is just lie down flat that's a good idea okay good advice
43:32
foreign
43:45
[Music] soldiers are wearing their little Navy outfits I love their little Navy they're
43:51
wearing the white and blue it's like little Navy outfits I missed that yeah yeah because they're Navy right they're on the water here as a Navy man myself I
43:58
just noticed they're wearing Navy uniforms can you imagine these guys just woke up today we're patrolling the area you know just normal Patrol day and like
44:04
hey this is our big day go man that 50 cal and just open fire like this is the biggest day of their career right here
44:10
well it's about to end poorly but it started off really good it started off really fun they had a lot of fun [Music]
44:22
now if you remember dear listeners that ramble saw that there was an RPG in that
44:27
little Hut there the power Captain showed him earlier I had a feeling it might be used later and here we go so
44:33
he's grabbed it and now he's gonna lay waste to the uh Vietnamese Army
44:40
what you gonna feel bad about because if you think about it those two young Sailors on that boat now they're
44:46
Vietnamese Soldiers and Sailors mind you but they're not doing anything wrong they were told that hey we've I just
44:52
find it funny they're just two Sailors doing their job it's like they don't they don't really have a any say in what
44:58
happens in their countries what I'm saying but they were told hey we got people stealing prisoners can you get the can you get them back but no no oh
45:05
well [Music]
45:21
so classical scene here where of course Rambo blows up the uh I love the
45:26
explosions there watching those edits blows up the Vietnamese um patrol boat he's about to jump off the boat but
45:33
before he can there is a Vietnamese Soldier or pirate above ramble who now
45:38
strangles ramble around the neck wow the patrol boat solely creeps its way to the pirate boat to collide and explode and
45:45
so we have this uh action sequence of course everyone's seen this hundred times in this film where ramble's got to
45:50
fend off this guy and escape the incoming explosions watch that play out
45:55
[Music]
46:10
oh my God
46:16
[Music]
46:28
[Music]
46:38
the music still kicks in again here that moment with the music it really kind of captures doesn't it the Elation yeah
46:45
she's so excited you know and uh it's it's almost quaint to see those little explosions now compared to like again
46:52
the Marvel Universe explosions and craziness is this kind of quaint to see these two bolts Collide and go boom it
46:57
almost seems quaint compared to today's but I like it I love the effect of that now I don't know if it's a stunt man or
47:04
if that's Sly I know slide does some of his stunts in this film but because it's so panned out so far I
47:09
don't think a slide jumping off that explosion with the boat what do you think I never stopped to sing I'd have to have a really kind of good look I
47:15
mean it seemed convincing I mean everything looked right in terms of the kind of statue of physique but it could
47:21
easily be somebody else but I didn't really capture but if indeed that is all sequence the way it is and he is jumping
47:27
that explosions happened I imagine it would have to be a stunt man because it seems a bit close to comfort like you're right about the physique it's hard to
47:33
say that it could be Sly but it's just because it's so far back you think that if it was Sly taking that wrist it would
47:39
just have a closer shot too or a different like a a multi-charact dude see look it's Sly doing it I know the
47:45
stand with the explosion on the cliffs where he jumps off the cliffs with the water later in the film I believe that is Sly because he mentions that his feet
47:51
got singed uh with the explosion when he jumps off that okay
47:59
what all right so they made it across they're going back to the land Rambo's armed
48:04
himself now of course with the weapons from the pirate boat he made sure he grabbed some before he left the boat
48:10
changes let me go on from here you better I stay till end
48:15
you see it bambo you're not expendable
48:24
you see their relationship building through these things [Music]
48:32
we'll stop it there of course the viewers of the show know where this is headed but that's a good natural place
48:37
to stop so what's happened is Cove has gone her way Rambo's gone his way with her pow of course to uh extract the
48:44
evidence with him like he does have photos but he has better than photos we'll get to that discussion to the next episode John uh how did you feel was
48:50
this the first podcast you've ever been on or she never this is the first podcast of being on the arm yeah it
48:55
feels there's too much to try and get in because it's I was actually a bit worried when we were watching this because when you told me the minutes
49:01
we'd be starting on I thought there's not an awful lot there in terms of us to comment on a lot of it in the jungle in
49:08
the dark but actually watching it with you now I realize there's quite a lot going on if you really start picking it apart yeah that's the beauty of these
49:14
podcasts yeah I find the same thing there's always something to comment on it's fun it's like a watch party it's a watch party and we record it and we send
49:21
out to our audience before we close though is there any final thoughts you want to say regarding the psychology of
49:26
John Rambo of why he is the way yeah I guess so I was just thinking when we
49:32
were talking about those moments of vulnerability that we see in the film The heavily guarded generally because to
49:37
sit with that is so raw and you saw it end of the first film First Blood just
49:43
how overwhelming sitting with that vulnerability and the trauma and all what he's been through and so I guess it
49:49
doesn't take much you don't have to press many of Rambo's button for him to incubate himself against that kind of
49:54
rawness and so his reactions when he's adrenalized keep him secure in that way they keep him away from those spaces
50:01
those tender those fragile spaces he's very incubated a lot of the time as a consequence of the PTSD it's interesting
50:08
to see that because you could kind of just consider it for the lens of the equal opposites it makes sense when you
50:14
see a sort of extreme behavior when you see his extreme vulnerability on the other side commenting earlier about
50:20
we're having a nature nurture debate if I kind of just think about anger and I apply that to this model here
50:26
I don't think anyone's really born angry when you start dissecting the rationale for somebody's anger normally they've
50:33
had some trauma they've had some upset they've been bullied they've been whatever it is they've been abused
50:38
something pretty terrible has happened and if you like this after a while perhaps for some some kind of pact I'm
50:45
never going to go there again I'm never going to experience that kind of rawness again that openness that vulnerability
50:52
right that sensitivity and so these ways of being if you like do something to
50:57
keep you incubated from that but as you can see it's not always the best way of being although uh yes for the Rambo
51:05
franchise that's all we want to see I suppose yeah if we if we had a stable well-adjusted John ramble who that had
51:11
the rebel franchise yeah so I guess exactly we thank ramble for his trauma for making such fun films for us to
51:19
watch that's awesome insight as you were talking I was thinking boy people that are like educated smart little listen to
51:25
my show I just find that funny I don't know why I find that funny because I don't know why I just made me laugh I
51:32
was thinking of all the different people that listen to my podcast that I guess some might be educated
51:37
well again you know I mentioned a name of a friend of mine at the beginning of the show who got me into this franchise
51:42
build he was the one who told me about your podcast oh and so he sent me some links and so I started listening to them
51:49
and Bill's not the educated one so he's not educated that makes sense okay thanks Bill I appreciate it yeah I won't
51:56
pass comment on Bill too much but uh nevertheless he was the link okay that one see there you go that makes more
52:02
sense it takes a non-educated person to tell people about my show and I'm just joking Bill I'm sure you're very smart a very smart lad as they say in your part
52:09
of the woods all right well it's been an absolute pleasure uh John having you on the show hearing your Insight so just
52:15
having a you're the first kind of like listener so to speak of the show that's kind of guest host because everyone
52:20
else's guest host has been someone I've already known and or is a podcaster themselves so you're kind of the the
52:26
first I'm professional professional to be on the on the podcast there you go I'm on it thank you well the honor is
52:32
mine thank you for taking the time out of your day and joining me today so again John thank you so much for coming
52:38
on the show and being a part of season two of it's a long row but unfortunately we've reached the end of the episode but
52:45
as you well know Ryan nothing is over nothing you just don't turn it off