Category: First Blood

5 Essential Sylvester Stallone Films

Craig / / 2013, Cop Land, Expendables, First Blood, Get Carter, John Rambo, Nighthawks, Rambo, Rocky, Rocky Balboa

On January 30, 2013, AZCentral.com posted 5 Essential Sylvester Stallone Films.  Their choices [with embeded trailers]:

  1. Rocky
  2. First Blood
  3. Cop Land
  4. Rocky Balboa
  5. The Expendables
While it would be hard to argue with their list, I think I would pair Rocky/Rocky Balboa and First Blood / Rambo.  This would open up two slots and I’d add: Get Carter and Nighthawks. – Craig

Rambo Bridge Sculpt Action for Charity

Craig / / 2012, First Blood


SZoners, Here’s an important message from Reegs about the Rambo Bridge Sculpture Auction with all proceeds going to charity.  Take it away, Reegs…

“Guys as some of you may know, the First Blood Bridge sculpture that I was kindly given by Inge Wilson, Brian McKinney and Riley Forman of Hope BC will be auctioned off on eBay starting midnight Nov 30th and will run through until Christmas Eve!


I have also donated a yellow First Blood Rambo bridge sign and RAM30 baseball cap which were only available at the 30th, to help promote the sale, which is for a very worthy cause, which is for the Fraser Canyon Hospice. All the proceeds will go to Camp Skylark which helps young children come to terms with losing a parent through death.

 

Here is a promotional video that I compiled and my friend Jerome who is also a fellow zoner edited and made it just so poignant to the cause. I couldn’t have done this without Jerome’s hard work and skills.

 

So PLEASE bid generously!  Here’s the link to the auction.

 

– Reegs

Want to Own a Piece of the “Rambo Bridge”?

Craig / / 2012, First Blood

Recently, SZoner, Reegs aka Raven sent in the following:

  • Hi Craig
  • I was wondering if you could help me at all? As you may have read in my Junk In Your Pockets thread, was that I was awarded along with a few others, a sculpt made from parts of the Rambo bridge. It was a huge surprise to get it, and it for me was just about the ultimate collectors item for the movie apart from Sly’s screen used costume or knife. Although I was honored and ecstatic with the gift, I knew right away what I had to do with it, so as I was at the mike accepting it, I gave it back, asking that it went to Camp Skylark, which is a local Hope charity sponsored by the Fraser canyon Hospice, which is a summer camp for children who have lost a parent through death.
  • It is now in Inge Wilson’s (Hope visitor center) safe keeping, and will be auctioned off very shortly, with that in mind pal, would you be able to maybe make an announcement about this on your front page on this site? Any help would be very much appreciated buddy, the more people know about the auction, hopefully the more money can be raised for this worthy charity.


Happy to help.  It was great of you to donate your piece.  Hopefully a true fan will end up with it!  – Craig

Coverage of the Hope, First Blood Anniversary Celebration

Craig / / 2012, First Blood, Sly Fan

I recently received the following e-mail from SZoner, Curtis.  Curtis was at the recent celebration of the 30th anniversary of the filming of First Blood.  Here’s what Curtis had to say…

  • Hello Craig,
  • How’s everything? As you probably already know from other S-Zoners who were there, the First Blood event in Hope took place over the (Canadian) Thanksgiving weekend at the beginning of October. At the 25th anniversary, I was the only one taking video…this time, the organizers were making their own documentary, there was a team of professional documentary makers from Seattle (I think) up to record the events, and Herve from France was doing plenty of filming too (with some very impressive gear). I felt a bit embarrassed with my puny little camera!
  • My wife Silmara is originally from Brazil, so a Brazilian entertainment website, Omelete, commissioned some photos, video and an article about the anniversary from us. The article is in Portuguese, but you’ll be able to enjoy the video – just three minutes of highlights from the weekend.You can check it out here.
  • Feel free to post the link on your site if you think it’ll be of interest to other Stallone/Rambo fans.It was a good weekend – the weather was lovely – in fact, Hope was the warmest place in Canada that weekend! – but some hardcore fans were disappointed the town wasn’t as dark and gloomy as it was in the movie. However, the following week, they’ll be pleased to know, was indeed cold and rainy – the landscape became, as Stallone describes it in his First Blood DVD commentary, “melancholy,” allowing Rambo-esque feelings of being lethal to come through.
  • That’s all for now – thanks and enjoy your Sunday,
  • – Curtis
Thanks for the update, Curtis.  The video was well done.  Eagle-eyed SZoners will spot SZoner, Raven in the video! – Craig

Ted Kotcheff: Rambo’s Alternate Ending

Craig / / 2012, First Blood


On October 15, 2012, Complex Pop Culture posted an interview with Ted Kotcheff, director of First Blood. Here’s a tidbit:

  • We shot the suicide ending, and then Sylvester came up to me and said, “God, what we’ve done to this character, he jumps off cliffs, he’s chased by dogs, he’s shot and he has to sew up his own arm. After all of that, we’re gonna kill him?” One thing about Sly, he always had a popular sense of what audiences wanted to see. I said, “We’ve always conceived of it this way.” He says, “Do you want to come back here three months from now when the distributor asks for a happy ending?” I said no. [Laughs.]

– Craig