50 Stallone Movies Ranked From Best To Worst
3) RAMBO 2 (1985)
It has a paltry 6.3 rating on the IMDb. It has an even lower 29% rating on amen-corner Rotten Tomatoes. It was nominated and/or awarded for worst picture, worst actor, worst director and worst screenplay. But those conformists are all wrong. Rambo: First Blood Part II is one of history’s greatest action sequels and a movie that was never given its due. Critically it was the whipping boy and easy target. Few had the balls to tell it like really was – this was exceptional film making and among the very best Stallone appeared in. I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to put it up there with Aliens and Terminator 2 as far as sequel behemoths go. Remember, Rambo II came before either of those movies so for a year, at least, it was the second greatest action sequel of all time. The first a little George Miller movie that came in ’81.
And even then, the plot isn’t so bad. Prisoners of war left behind was still a bit of a political hot potato in the early/mid ’80s. The bureaucrats sold men out. ‘Forgotten ghosts’ were rendered expendable. Another aspect of the story worth reconsidering all these years later though, is the question of Rambo’s legal status. The possibility of a presidential pardon is offered, should Rambo successfully carry out his mission. But technically he failed the mission, his orders were to photograph a POW camp. His sidekick warns him that he isn’t allowed to actually enter the camp, but he replies with ‘no more orders’. This causes the USAF to leave him in the lurch at the extraction point. Later, Rambo destroys a command center and disappears into Southeast Asia. He doesn’t emerge again until the end of Rambo IV, in Arizona – shouldn’t he still be a fugitive?
Rambo II is also Sly Stallone’s most profitable movie ever, according to Wikipedia. From a 25 million budget, it took 300.4 million.
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