Rambo

Rambo (2008) is the most violent mainstream action film ever made, and Stallone wields that violence with surprising purpose. Set during the real Burmese civil war, the film follows an aging John Rambo living in self-imposed exile in Thailand. When a group of Christian missionaries is captured by the Burmese military, Rambo is reluctantly drawn back into combat. The first 40 minutes are almost contemplative — Stallone’s weathered face carries decades of trauma, and the film takes its time establishing the horror of the Burmese genocide.

Then the violence begins, and it is staggering. Stallone uses a Browning M2 .50 caliber machine gun to reduce an army to pulp. Limbs are severed. Bodies explode. The carnage is so extreme that it crosses from exploitation into something resembling a statement: this is what war actually does to human bodies, and it is monstrous. The film’s final battle has an estimated body count of over 200.

Rambo is not subtle. It is not sophisticated. But Stallone’s commitment to showing the real consequences of the violence that action movies typically sanitize gives the film a raw power that its 38% Rotten Tomatoes score does not reflect.