Monday 1 September 2008

Movie Review: First Blood (1982)


There was a time when action movies could deliver entertainment without resorting to a cartoonish computer-generated special-effects laden climax every 10 minutes. First Blood is a reminder that an action movie can be remarkably low key in its setting and character development, and yet deliver a strong punch when based on a message inspired by real events and memorable personalities.

Sylvester Stallone, when he was famous but not yet a joke, is John Rambo, a Vietnam war veteran back in the US who is devastated to find out at the beginning of the film that the sole other combat survivor from his Special Forces unit has succumbed to cancer.

In a representation of the poor welcome home afforded to most Vietnam vets, Rambo is treated badly by the Sheriff (Brian Dennehy, who puts in an excellent but slightly exaggerated performance) and police force of a small local northwest town. The maltreatment triggers the soldier to revert back to war mode in the surrounding hills and forests (the movie is filmed in and around the town of Hope, British Columbia), and soon the war expands to include the clueless local contingent of the National Guard, who are as over-matched as the police, and Rambo gradually draws the conflict back to a final showdown within the town.

Richard Crenna arrives as Rambo's field commander and mentor, and as the police and National Guard are scurrying around pretending to know something about warfare in the forest, Crenna delivers the classic line to Dennehy: "I don't think you understand. I didn't come to rescue Rambo from you. I came here to rescue you from him."

First Blood is part of Hollywood's thoughtful post-Vietnam war examination of the conflict, an era that resulted in large scale epics like Deer Hunter (1978) and Apocalypse Now (1979), as well as smaller scale films like Coming Home (1978) and Platoon (1986).

Stallone would subsequently achieve stratospheric commercial success with Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985), which while undeniably entertaining, unfortunately sacrificed nuance in favour of a jingoism.

In First Blood, Rambo is a hero who feels pain both emotional and physical, bleeds, has to tend to his wounds, tries to stop the conflict before it escalates, and spares the life of most of his enemies. Directed by Ted Kotcheff and running an efficient 96 minutes, First Blood delivers its message with uncommon integrity.






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Movie Review: Gunfight At The OK Corral (1957)


Burt Lancaster is lawman Wyatt Earp, Kirk Douglas is gunfighter / gambler / dentist Doc Holliday, and together they forge an unlikely alliance to clean up lawlessness in Tombstone.

Gunfight At The OK Corral is based on true events and real characters, but of course the Hollywood treatment is lathered on in great quantities to create fiction and fact at least in equal doses. In reality the actual Gunfight took a matter of seconds. In the movie, it is a solid 10 minute battle, but with unquestionable entertainment value.

Directed by John Sturges, this is a classic western where good and evil are clearly defined but with intriguing shades of moral ambiguity. These mostly revolve around Doc Holliday, by far the most interesting of the main characters and made more so by Douglas' shifty performance. Holliday is a man one step ahead of death, and it's coming at him both from the disease eating away at him, and from the next gunslinger to challenge him. In the meantime he focuses on gambling, drinking, womanizing and finding the thin path that will keep him alive one more day.

In contrast Lancaster's Wyatt Earp is for the most part the prototypical and somewhat boring lawman with a strong moral compass who believes in the righteousness of his actions, and is presented in the film as representative of the type of leader who transitioned the West from rampant lawlessness to a more civilized era.

That Earp forges some sort of friendship with Holliday morally weakens the lawman but strengthens his firepower. And when the bullets start flying in the excellent but historically inaccurate final showdown, firepower is definitely the way to go.

To the film's credit, Earp also has to make a decision to transform the dispute with the cattle rustlers into a personal family feud rather than follow due legal process. In reality, after the OK Corral showdown, Earp became an uncontrollable law unto himself, and embarked on an almost mythical quest to clean up the West without concerning himself too much with the nuances of the law, events that are more fully explored in Tombstone (1993).

Sturges does a fine job steering the film to its climax, introducing a rich tapestry of characters, events, and locations. At just over two hours in length, the story is provided relaxed room to breathe and develop, accompanied by Dimitri Tiomkin's evocative soundtrack. 






All Ace Black Blog Movie Reviews are here.