David Galindo
Screenwriter
- Joined
- Mar 30, 2003
- Messages
- 1,264
[c]Rambo: First Blood (UMD)
Region 1 • R • Dolby Digital • Available Now
[/c]
Lion’s Gate’s releases have always been a bit simple, but work just fine. Rambo continues the trend with a pretty solid UMD.
Thoughts on the Movie
I have only seen bits and pieces of First Blood, so it was a real treat to watch the movie in its entirety. The movie was great, although it felt a bit empty and ended somewhat forcefully.
John Rambo is a Vietnam vet who goes to a house in the mountains to search for a lost Vietnam buddy, only to find he died of cancer. So he staggers onto the highway, not really knowing where to go or what to do from here...and a local small town cop named Teasle (Brian Dennehy) takes him for a ride out of town, explaining how they don’t like his kind round’ those parts. Soon Rambo tries to backtrack to the town, only to have Teasle arrest him...and hoo boy, does it ever escalate from there.
I have to say Stallone totally sold me on Rambo, as he plays him straightforward with hardly any emotion. Dennehy is fantastic as the sheriff who slowly realizes he’s way over his head, yet still pushes forward to capture Rambo. There are times where Rambo takes on the entire army and police force as he destroys a small town, for reasons I’m still slightly unclear about.
Basically, Schwarzenegger had his Total Recall, and Stallone had First Blood. To miss either of these movies would be a shame since both present a fair amount of intelligence and depth, but not so much as to get in the way of the action. Hey, they got people to kill, and don’t got no time for contemplating their existence.
Video Quality
Thankfully Lion’s Gate decided to keep First Blood in a 2.35 ratio...woo! The film looks fine, and although the colors aren’t exactly vibrant, this is a small mountain town in the middle of winter...so there isn’t much color to begin with. The black levels, however, could be better. The detail is pretty sharp, and although the film shows its age slightly, it’s a pretty good transfer overall.
3/5
Audio Quality
The audio is well separated and is really loud when it needs to be. The bass is slightly lacking, but the mids and highs of the track are very clear and loud. The commentary track is a bit low in the volume however, but other than that everything seems to be just fine. Nice track overall.
3.5/5
Extras
First Blood opens with the Lion’s Gate logo and then goes directly to the menu...no forced trailers thankfully. There is no music on the menus, but they still look nice and have a chapter selection.
The only featurette is the Alternate Ending (2:02) that shows Rambo committing suicide, which has a much greater impact than the original ending...but I cannot necessarily say better. At least it stayed true to the book.
Ah, but that’s not all. Lion’s Gate was the first studio to put commentaries on their UMD releases, and the trend continues. You get a full length commentary by Sylvester Stallone that was included with the Rambo Ultimate Trilogy DVD set, but not the Rambo SE DVD set...so depending which set you have (if any), this might be new stuff for you. Stallone does a great job explaining the book and the movie, how he thought Rambo was a terrible idea from the beginning, how he injured himself to which he talks about over and over again (yet he is at least honest...in the middle of describing a broken finger, he says, “I really shouldn’t complain or talk about all this since I was paid so well...but anyways, there I was with my broken finger...”)
Stallone also shares some pretty amusing stories, not the least of which when he goes to the ER in the small town they were filming at, as he was covered in fake Rambo wounds from the set...but you’ve gotta hear that one for yourself.
Oddly, while watching the commentary the video and sound started to get out of sync and finally the video stuttered and sped up at random moments. Taking the UMD out and putting it back in seemed to do the trick, so maybe it was just my disc. Overall, this is a small amount of features but they really complement the movie well (unlike, say, a fluffy behind the scenes feature that has the actors patting each other on the back).
3.5/5
Overall…
The retail for the UMD starts at $14, and you can likely find it cheaper than that. Good video and audio as well as some nice extras make this UMD hard to pass up, although there is room for improvement for future Lion’s Gate releases (stating with that video transfer). Solid UMD overall.
3.5/5
Region 1 • R • Dolby Digital • Available Now
[/c]Lion’s Gate’s releases have always been a bit simple, but work just fine. Rambo continues the trend with a pretty solid UMD.
Thoughts on the Movie
I have only seen bits and pieces of First Blood, so it was a real treat to watch the movie in its entirety. The movie was great, although it felt a bit empty and ended somewhat forcefully.
John Rambo is a Vietnam vet who goes to a house in the mountains to search for a lost Vietnam buddy, only to find he died of cancer. So he staggers onto the highway, not really knowing where to go or what to do from here...and a local small town cop named Teasle (Brian Dennehy) takes him for a ride out of town, explaining how they don’t like his kind round’ those parts. Soon Rambo tries to backtrack to the town, only to have Teasle arrest him...and hoo boy, does it ever escalate from there.
I have to say Stallone totally sold me on Rambo, as he plays him straightforward with hardly any emotion. Dennehy is fantastic as the sheriff who slowly realizes he’s way over his head, yet still pushes forward to capture Rambo. There are times where Rambo takes on the entire army and police force as he destroys a small town, for reasons I’m still slightly unclear about.
Basically, Schwarzenegger had his Total Recall, and Stallone had First Blood. To miss either of these movies would be a shame since both present a fair amount of intelligence and depth, but not so much as to get in the way of the action. Hey, they got people to kill, and don’t got no time for contemplating their existence.
Video Quality
Thankfully Lion’s Gate decided to keep First Blood in a 2.35 ratio...woo! The film looks fine, and although the colors aren’t exactly vibrant, this is a small mountain town in the middle of winter...so there isn’t much color to begin with. The black levels, however, could be better. The detail is pretty sharp, and although the film shows its age slightly, it’s a pretty good transfer overall.
3/5
Audio Quality
The audio is well separated and is really loud when it needs to be. The bass is slightly lacking, but the mids and highs of the track are very clear and loud. The commentary track is a bit low in the volume however, but other than that everything seems to be just fine. Nice track overall.
3.5/5
Extras
First Blood opens with the Lion’s Gate logo and then goes directly to the menu...no forced trailers thankfully. There is no music on the menus, but they still look nice and have a chapter selection.
The only featurette is the Alternate Ending (2:02) that shows Rambo committing suicide, which has a much greater impact than the original ending...but I cannot necessarily say better. At least it stayed true to the book.
Ah, but that’s not all. Lion’s Gate was the first studio to put commentaries on their UMD releases, and the trend continues. You get a full length commentary by Sylvester Stallone that was included with the Rambo Ultimate Trilogy DVD set, but not the Rambo SE DVD set...so depending which set you have (if any), this might be new stuff for you. Stallone does a great job explaining the book and the movie, how he thought Rambo was a terrible idea from the beginning, how he injured himself to which he talks about over and over again (yet he is at least honest...in the middle of describing a broken finger, he says, “I really shouldn’t complain or talk about all this since I was paid so well...but anyways, there I was with my broken finger...”)
Stallone also shares some pretty amusing stories, not the least of which when he goes to the ER in the small town they were filming at, as he was covered in fake Rambo wounds from the set...but you’ve gotta hear that one for yourself.
Oddly, while watching the commentary the video and sound started to get out of sync and finally the video stuttered and sped up at random moments. Taking the UMD out and putting it back in seemed to do the trick, so maybe it was just my disc. Overall, this is a small amount of features but they really complement the movie well (unlike, say, a fluffy behind the scenes feature that has the actors patting each other on the back).
3.5/5
Overall…
The retail for the UMD starts at $14, and you can likely find it cheaper than that. Good video and audio as well as some nice extras make this UMD hard to pass up, although there is room for improvement for future Lion’s Gate releases (stating with that video transfer). Solid UMD overall.
3.5/5
