In Germany the first parts of this series are called “Rambo”, “Rambo II – Der Autrag”, “Rambo III”. Thus the foruth part got the US working title “John Rambo” to distinct it from the first part. I have to confess, I like it better because it resembles the title of the last Rocky movie, “Rocky Balboa”.

Yesterday I went to the theatre. Unfortunately, JR is cut in Germany (~1 minute) but I wanted to see a Rambo movie in the theatres. And you got what you paid for: A very monosyllabic Rambo and a fight in which those survive which are allowed to survive by John.

Regarding cuts: The archive footage at the beginning is seen. When children are shot, men get limbs hacked off, women are raped: all that can you see. But when Rambo kills the bad guys then every gore is cut out, for whatever reason. Don’t ask me why I couldn’t tell you if my life would depend on it.

If you watch the above trailer you see everything you won’t see in a german theatre.

Additionally I missed the scene where the priest and Rambo prayed.

It was intended to let Rambo tell us his view on the world but Stallone decided to cut it out because Rambo is more the quiet guy:

“Old men start wars. Young men fight them. And everyone in the middle gets killed. War is natural. Peace is an accident. We’re animals.”

My opinion: JR is a movie in the tradition of the Rambo movies and I will buy it uncut in RC1-country.

PS: Ironically the female lead is Julie Benz who plays the vampire Darla in the series “Angel” I’m currently watching.