End of the road

Toby Young

Wednesday, 20th February 2008

Rambo
18, nationwide

It could be worse, I suppose. At one stage, Sylvester Stallone announced that Rambo IV would focus on ‘environmental concerns’. Has the sexagenarian actor finally decided to become respectable? Back when the first Rambo film came out, over a quarter of a century ago, his only rivals in the right-wing action stakes were Clint Eastwood and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Now that the former has become America’s Greatest Living Director and the latter governor of California, Stallone may think that the time has come for him to renounce his controversial past.

Then again, he may just be scraping the bottom of the barrel. After unsuccessful attempts to reinvent himself as a comedian (Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot) and a serious actor (Cop Land), Stallone has been reduced to appearing as a ‘Special Guest Star’ in Las Vegas, a long-running TV show, and producing his own reality series (The Contender). Two years ago, he squeezed one last film out of the Rocky franchise — the sixth, if I’m not mistaken — so it comes as no surprise that he has decided to dust off the Rambo franchise as well. Like the battle-scarred Vietnam vet, whom we see returning to his family farm at the end of the film, Stallone has finally come to the end of the road.

Silver Surfers may enjoy watching the 61-year-old perform all his own stunts, but it should be noted that they are considerably less demanding than they were in Rambo’s last outing. Indeed, Stallone the director tiptoes around Stallone the actor, sparing him the indignity of having to do anything too strenuous or, worse, remove his shirt. He can still run through a forest at a tidy clip, but the wet work with a Commando Knife is largely a thing of the past. Perhaps that’s the reason there are no helicopters in this film: Stallone is simply too old to jump out of them.

Now that the sinner has repented, will Hollywood’s liberal gatekeepers allow him into heaven? I see a Lifetime Achievement Award in his future.