Rambo: First Blood Part II

**Rambo: First Blood Part II** is a 1985 film starring Sylvester Stallone, Richard Crenna, Charles Napier and Steven Berkoff, directed by George P. Cosmatos, written by Stallone and James Cameron and produced by Buzz Feitshans.

## Plot

Three years into his sentence, former commando John Rambo is visited by his old commander, Colonel Sam Trautman. With the war in Vietnam over, the public has become increasingly concerned over news that a small group of US POWs have been left in enemy custody. To placate their demands for action, the US government has authorized a solo infiltration mission to confirm the reports. As one of only three men suited for such work, Rambo agrees to undertake the operation in exchange for a pardon. He is taken to meet Marshall Murdock, a bureaucratic government official overseeing the operation. Rambo is temporarily reinstated into the US Army and instructed that he is only to photograph a possible camp and not to rescue any prisoners or engage enemy personnel, as they will be retrieved by a better equipped extraction team upon his return.

During his insertion, Rambo's parachute becomes tangled and breaks, causing him to lose his guns and most of his equipment, leaving him with only his knives and a bow with specialized arrows. He meets his assigned contact, a young intelligence agent named Co-Bao, who arranges for a local river pirate band to take them upriver. Reaching the camp, Rambo spots one of the prisoners tied to a cross shaped post, left to suffer from exposure, and rescues him against orders. During escape, they are discovered by Vietnamese troops and attacked. When a gunboat manages to catch up, the pirates betray them out of fear. Rambo kills the pirates and destroys the gunboat with a rocket launcher while the POW and Co-Bao swim to safety. When the trio reaches the extraction point, the helicopter is ordered by Murdock to abort, who claims Rambo has violated his orders. When Trautman confronts him, Murdock also reveals that he never intended to save any POWs if any should be found, but to leave them to save Congress the money it would take to buy their freedom and evade any possibility of further war.

Co-Bao escapes, but Rambo and the POW are recaptured and returned to the camp. There, Rambo learns that Soviet troops are arming and training the Vietnamese. He is turned over to the local liaison, Lieutenant Colonel Podovsky, and his right-hand man, Sergeant Yushin, for interrogation. Upon learning of Rambo's mission from intercepted missives, Podovsky demands that Rambo broadcast a message warning against further rescue missions for POWs under fatal cost. Meanwhile, Co infiltrates the camp disguised as a prostitute and comes to the hut in which Rambo is held captive. Rambo at first refuses to cooperate, but relents when the prisoner he tried to save is threatened. But instead of reading the scripted comments, Rambo directly threatens Murdock, then subdues the Russians with Co's help and escapes into the jungle. They kiss, and Rambo agrees to take Co back to the United States. However, a small Vietnamese force attacks the pair, and Co is killed. An enraged Rambo kills the soldiers and buries Co's body in the mud.

With the use of his weapons and guerrilla training, Rambo systematically dispatches the numerous Soviet and Vietnamese soldiers sent after him. After barely surviving a barrel bomb dropped by Yushin's helicopter, Rambo climbs on board, throws Yushin out of the cabin in a brief but intense fight, and takes control. He lays waste to the prison camp and kills all of the remaining enemy forces before extracting the POWs and heading towards friendly territory in Thailand. Podovsky, pursuing in a helicopter gunship seemingly shoots them down and moves in for the kill. Having faked the crash, Rambo uses a rocket launcher to destroy the aircraft, killing the gunner, the co-pilot, and Podovsky.

Returning to base with the POWs, Rambo, after using the helicopter's machine gun to destroy Murdock's office, confronts the terrified man with his knife, demanding that Murdock rescue the remaining POWs. Trautman then confronts Rambo and tries to convince him to return home now that he has been pardoned. An angry Rambo responds that he only wants his country to love its soldiers as much as its soldiers love it. The film credits roll as Rambo walks off into the distance while his mentor watches him.