Rambo Review

Grade: C

The Sylvester Stallone farewell tour continues with the release of ‘Rambo’ the fourth installment of the ‘First Blood’ movies that debuted in the early 80s. John Rambo, one of Stallone’s cornerstone characters-- outside of the Rocky Balboa— the soft-spoken Vietnam veteran who has seen more than enough violence in his lifetime has retreated to Thailand working as a river guide on his boat.

A very melodramatic Rambo is soon offered a paying job to guide a mission group that is looking to help those caught in the middle of the war in Burma. Against his better judgment Rambo takes the group up to a nearby village in Burma, soon after the missionaries arrive, the rampaging government that kidnaps healthy young boys, forcing the children into military service, attacks the village. Once word reaches back to the States about what has happened the minister of the missionary’s church recruits Rambo to join other mercenaries to bring back the kidnapped evangelists and a daring rescue mission of seemingly insurmountable odds is begun.

In the final chapter of the John Rambo saga, the direction that Stallone takes the character and the franchise to new extremes. ‘Rambo’ also lets the audience almost believe that a small mercenary group armed with only a few semi-automatics, a single sniper rifle and Rambo with a self-fashioned machete can take out an entire national army. While the missionaries are quite possibly the most arrogant and stupid people alive.

The mission group leader, Michael (Paul Shulze) expositions that he’s been into Burma several times before and “nothing bad has happened before.” As his tag-team partner in the annoying corner we have Sarah (Julie Benz,) who is dedicated to hers and the team’s volunteer duty to helping the Burmese village and apparently just walk around and bask in her self-righteousness of just walking around the village looking pretty while the others are off “fulfilling their commitment” as is frequently said by them.

Unlike its predecessors ‘Rambo’ does not hold to a reality that you can be sucked into. We are re-introduced to a very somber, and remorseful Rambo, he still kills with ease and little hesitance, but much to his own disdain. The only thing that keeps this movie afloat is the gore, violence and intense (although obviously absurd) action sequences.

‘Rambo’ is the latest in a series of classic movies getting a last hurrah, like the upcoming ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ (May 22, 2008) to go along with previous releases of ‘Live Free or Die Hard,’ ‘Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines’ and the aforementioned ‘Rocky Balboa.’

Cloverfield Review

Grade: B

The cat is finally out of the bag and J.J. Abrams big monster movie ‘Cloverfield’ has smashed its way into theaters. Released behind a shroud of mystery about what kind of monster will be destroying the city of New York this time.

On the night of Rob Hawkins’ going away party the city of New York comes under attack by an unknown assailant. All we know is that it is big, mean and unstoppable. In an effort to flee the city Rob, his brother Jason, and friends Hud, Marlena and Lily take off from their Central Park apartment towards the Brooklyn Bridge. On the way to the bridge Rob gets a short-lived, desperate phone call from his best friend Beth. This sends Rob into a race against time to find Beth and still evacuate to get out of the monsters destructive rampage. After the monster’s immediate emergence a shocking scene of the Chrysler building being knocked down and seeing the citizens running from the cloud of debris is enough to make anyone’s heart pound.

‘Cloverfield’ is shot from the first-person perspective of Hudson ‘Hud’ Platt, one of Rob’s closest friends. Hud’s dedicated to hold on to his camera and document all the terrifying events of the night, along with his commentary that probably speaks the audiences mind. Although the thought of a ‘Blair Witch’ style film may turn some stomachs, it is quite possibly the most ingenious idea for a new series for a new monster movie franchise. Similar to the “smoke monster” on Abrams’ hit show “Lost” the monster in ‘Cloverfield’ is cleverly concealed by buildings and quick movements by a frightened Hud while running for his life with his friends. One of the most unique aspects within the picture is sentimentality between Rob and Beth, and the suspense of running from the unknown threat.

Under the direction of Matt Reeves, and with the production stylings of Abrams ‘Cloverfield’ creates a sense of wonder, excitement and terror of what could be looming around every corner keeping the audience on the edge of its seat. With a running time of 85 minutes the movie may seem short on the way in, but once the opening credits begin time loses all meaning and the only thing running through everyone’s mind is “What’s going to happen next?” And if a monster tearing its way through NYC on its own isn’t scary enough, the cause for our terror also drops some crab-like minions that scurry through the city, able to get into places where our monster is too big. In some ways these guys are a scarier concept than the actual beast.

With a gross of $41 million over the long weekend, ‘Cloverfield’ took the record for highest gross in an opening weekend for a movie released in January, overtaking the “Star Wars” special edition released in 1997, it also had an opening day gross of $16.75 million for the month of January.

The Gladiators are Back

Viewers; are you ready?! You had better be, because the American Gladiators are back. After a 12-year absence from the airwaves the heart pounding action has returned with new gladiators and new challenges that will hurt you just watching.

Hosted by Terry “Hulk” Hogan and Laila Ali the new “American Gladiators” features bigger Gladiators than the ones most of us may remember from childhood, such as Justice- a 6’ 8”, 290 lbs Goliath. Other new male Gladiators include Mayhem, Militia, Toa, Wolf, and Titan; a late addition to the show during it’s first run. The female Gladiators are Crush, Fury, Venom, Siren, Stealth and the 6’ 1” 200+ lbs "Viking Vixen" Hellga (no, that’s not a typo.)

The new Gladiator Arena hosts many classic challenges that you may remember like Assault, Gauntlet, Hang Tough, Power Ball, Pyramid, The Wall, the giant Q-tip duel: Joust, along with a new and very intense twist on the shows final head-to-head contest: the Eliminator. New games Hit and Run where contestants have to run across a 50-foot suspension bridge while four Gladiators hurl 100-lb “demolition” balls at them trying to knock the contestants off the bridge.

Many of the contenders have Oprah-esque stories to go along with the chance to win $100,000, and a chance to become a new Gladiator for the coming season. For example- contender Adam Levin an alleged victim of hurricane Wilma who is looking for a fresh start with his potential winnings.

Earthquake is another new game where contenders wrestle gladiators trying to shove them off a platform that is suspended four feet in the air. This event started off with a big twist when a contender and Venom were about to both tumble over and Venom grabbed one of the suspension wires holding up the platform and spun around while staying on the platform. Preventing the contender from gaining any points.

contenders must climb a damp cargo net, next comes the classic hand-bikes, then comes the barrel roll with a 30-foot climb up the pyramid immediately after, followed by the zip-line, then the excruciating reverse escalator, then a steep stair climb and finally The new Eliminator blows away its predecessor. The contestants start off by climbing an eight-foot wall, after a 20-foot under water swim with a flaming surface overhead the breaking through a wall of padded blocks to stop the clock.

Compared to its predecessor the new “American Gladiators” is on par for what could be a successful run. The biggest problem with the show is with the Gladiators looking and acting like players in a WWE wrestling-opera. One Gladiator who may not last to a potential second season: Wolf. With his long hair, styled facial hair and tired attempts at building a fan base by howling every time they say his name, and calling out for his “wolf pack” with the fans in the arena. Usually this turns out with little to no response. Another potential cast-off from the new team may be Toa, who acts like former WWE star Wild Man Mark Mero.

The show appears to be off to a good start, debuting on Sunday, January 6th to a Nielson Rating of 4.4/11, which was good enough for the highest rated non-NFL product on TV that night. The reprise did even better the next night-- in the show’s regular time-slot-- with 10.91 million viewers while going up against the BCS Championship Game between LSU and Ohio State. And in it’s second week ranked number one for its time slot.