First Blood |  | Director: Ted Kotcheff
Actors: Sylvester Stallone, Brian Dennehy, Richard Crenna, Bill Mckinney, Jack Starrett
Studio: Live / Artisan
Category: DVD
List Price: $19.98
Buy New: $8.48
You Save: $11.50 (58%)
New (4) Used (7) from $2.65
Rating:  157 reviews
Sales Rank: 183610
Format: Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Region: 1
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Running Time: 94 Minutes
UPC: 012236115007
EAN: 0012236115007
ASIN: B00005Y7IA
Theatrical Release Date: October 22, 1982
Release Date: August 14, 2001
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
It's easy to forget that this Spartan, violent film, which begat the Rambo series, was such a big hit in 1982 because it was a good movie. Green Beret vet John Rambo (Sylvester Stallone) wanders into the wrong small town to find a fellow 'Nam buddy and gets the living heck kicked out of him by the local law enforcement (led by Brian Dennehy). The vet strikes back the only way he knows how, leading to a visceral, if unrealistic, flight and fight through the local mountains. Based on the 1972 novel by David Morrell, this film saved Stallone's then-foundering career and the Rambo character became the inspiration for countless political cartoons. But this film is Deliverance without the moral ambiguity. --Keith Simanton
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| Customer Reviews: Read 152 more reviews...
 ONE THIRD AWESOME/TWO-THIRDS AWFUL, WHY ? June 13, 2009
Francisco Santoni (USA)
Few movies have caused me to get upset as much as FIRST BLOOD. This is a thoroughly entertaining movie that I can pop into the DVD player anytime several times a month and not get tired of. This is a movie that I will stop to watch everytime I click into it while surfing on cable. Yet it's an exasperating movie as it starts off with a bang for the first third then turns into comic book. This one starts off so well: great storyline [Vietnam vet returns to couldn't-care-less US town], striking cinematography, really good acting, fine, poignant Jerry Goldsmith score.. Then with the appearance of Richard Crenna the film degenerates into a ludicrous bubble-gum flick---like night and day. Don't get me wrong, though, as I consider Crenna an excellent and underappreciated actor whose GREAT performance in THE SAND PEBBLES [1966] is never to be forgotten. However, in First Blood he is both miscast, misused and made a cartoon of. Briefly, Sylvester Stallone plays "John J." Rambo, an ex-vet
who returns home only to find reassimilation most difficult. Itinerant, jobless and homeless he walks the lonely roads of the Pacific Northwest looking for sustenance until he walks into a town with one tough and arrogant Sherrif who doesn't like "drifters" in his town. The Sherrif is played marvelously by the always-excellent Brian Dennehy who just plain takes over this film. Sherrif tries to translocate J.J. outta town but the "hard case" is resistant and is unjustly arrested and put in jail.
While being driven out of town by the law J.J., with a that steely, composed, been-there/done-that countenance, delivers THE great quote of the movie, "why you pushin me?". While in jail Rambo faces the brutality of a sadistic deputy played wonderfully by Jack Starrett. The vet is pushed too hard and goes berserk fighting his way out of the town jail and escaping into the wilderness on a motorcycle. All hell breaks loose, thereafter, as local cops launch a manhunt into the daunting, rocky countryside. One slight problem: they think he's some ex-hippie vet loser out to parasitize his way through life. In reality, he is an ex-Green Beret and an expert in killing and survival. The evolving situation is best summed up when one of the cocky Dennehy's deputies, upon getting word of Rambo's true origins, states: "..those Green Berets...they're real hard asses..". Chuckle-inducing and great, well-placed quote. Jaws drop, the tension screw is turned a bit more, and the manhunt becomes a cophunt. Once into the wilderness Rambo, who has survived in far worse environs, has the advantage and subsequently begins to pick these guys off one at a time. Time to call the State Police for help. BUT time for the movie to end and the parody to begin with Crenna's arrival. Crenna plays Rambo's Nam trainer, supervisor and Father-figure. He is so comical at the onset that you wonder whether this was intentional. Some lines like, "God didn't make Rambo, I made him", are plain nauseating. Even Crenna's articulation and inflection are preposterous. Stallone also provides some unintentional laughs. Upon escaping from jail he barrels his motorcycle down a sidewalk and yelps to bystanders to "get outta tha way" sounding like a schoolgirl yelling at a bully in some schoolyard. His subsequent plea to rifle-aiming police on a cliff "I don't want any more hurt" just makes me cringe. Yeah, sure, no more hurt after destroying their jail, upending a police car, almost wrecking a police helicopter and getting their top deputy killed. The look on Stallone's face as he glares into Starrett's bloodied, pulped face after the latter fell off the heli trying to cap J.J. is a beaut. Though not the actor he was in ROCKY Stallone's oft-criticized final monologue showed guts and was not that bad considering his slew of bad movies. Three stars for pure entertainment value including the so-promising first 1/3 of the film and the intentional + unintentional laughs. Too bad, as First Blood could have gone places but fell nose first like one of the Wright Brothers first planes. Wish this could be done over with a no-nonesense director and without Stallone's 'hamming it up' interference. Starrett, despite his limited time here, has got to be a candidate for the bad-ass hall-of-fame along with the likes of Neville Brande, Richard [Johnny Udo] Widmark, Lee Van Cleef, Jack Palance, Javier Bardem, Robert Mitchum, Robert [Max Cady] DeNiro and the like.
 Dated May 1, 2009
Alan Starr (Lawrence, MA)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Believe it or not, I had never actually this before (or any of the Rambo movies). Didn't do much for me - the directing and editing seem pretty dated, and I never felt much sympathy for the lead character. Not as awful as I thought it might be, not as good as I had hoped.
Forgot the Cheese April 25, 2009
W. Shalaby (Baltimore, Hon!)
I remembered how much I liked this movie as a kid, and at $10 I gave it a shot. The premise of the movie is still great, crooked cops mess with the wrong Green Beret, but man, is it cheesy by today's standards.
 Movie Evoked Different Emotions April 21, 2009
Lizwel (Baton Rouge, LA)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This movie about an American soldier, Rambo who comes to town looking for one of his comrades, and is treated like a common criminal by American law enforcement evoked different emotions in me. It evoked compassion for Rambo because of the way he was tortured by the enemy in the war, anger over the way he was treated by American law enforcers, and excitement because the movie is action-filled. I don't usually watch action flicks, and I know that this is mostly a guy movie, but as a female I loved this movie. Stallone did great.
A war you won't believe! April 15, 2009
Olde American (Richmond, Virginia)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
John Rambo is a vietnam vet and the last surviving member of an elite squad that went behind enemy lines numerous times to F stuff up on behalf of Uncle Sam, an unstoppable killing machine, trying to adjuct to "normal" life back in the US when a punk sheriff who doesn't know when to quit decides to pick on the unstoppable lad. Rambo muscles his way out of their podunk jail and escapes into the wilderness of the pacific northwest. They send in a few men after him, and with the virile rage of a wild beast he destroys them one at a time, telling the sheriff "In town your the law, but out here it's me!! Just let it go! You wan't a war!? I'll give you a war you won't believe!" But they don't let it go, and they pay the consequences.
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