First Blood

Ted Kotchef's First Blood is the story of a burned out Vietnam Vet, who after being trained as a Green Berette, and decorated with several metals of honor, has been dumped back into society and left to his own vices. Though generally a mild mannered individual, he has been trained not to be pushed. So when a judgemental Sheriff mistreats him, he brings the war to this small town, and this time he wants to win.

This film was filmed in Hope, British columbia, Canada, though it is meant to take place in the Northwestern United States. Adapted from David Morell's novel, this portrays John Rambo as a much more sympathetic character than the book, and shows the Sheriff as much less Sympathetic, and certainly less developed. When Rambo first has the run in with Sheriff Teasle, all of the shots seem to favor Teasle. When we see Rambo it is from a low angle, as if it were Teasle's POV, and when we see Teasle it is at eye level. Kotcheff might have, in my estimation, doen this for one of two reasons.

1. Perhaps he wanted to balance out the Sheriff's role which was dramatically chopped, and allow us to see things fromm his point of view a little bit more. 2. He might have been playing a gag on the audience, where we are used to cheering for the law, he might have been trying to trick us into thinking the hero was Teasle.

This film has been criticized for having a weak story, but for those who actually take time to analyze it we see a very thoughtful story there. Playing Mytholical images throughout, such as the cave the hero decends to, and the flaming sword (when he uses his knife as a torch), it has universal appeal. The high stakes in this film are dealing with internal demons, not external, which is primarily why people who look only on the surface of films criticize it, along with the comercialized sequels to follow.

The look of the film is very raw. Costumes are simple, using primarily and earth tones as. The sets are almost all outdoors, and generally also have a gritty feeling. The film is also quite dark at times, but the new DVD transfer is very good, so it is not too dark at all. The frames are very alive, and staged deepely. Rarely do we see a frame that does not convey depth. We see some handheld work at tense moments, and from the begining of the second act the action does not seem to stop.

Not a lot of reaserch has been done into Ted Kotcheff's style, but after viewing both First Blood and Uncommon Valor, There seems to be heavy influences from both Akira Kurosawa as well as Alfred Hitchcock in Kotcheff's work. In First Blood, here are some of the attributes we find that Kurosawa was known for:

• Camera is not close to the sight line
• There are often frames within frames
• The expantion of time is used to build suspence, followed by bursts of action
• Multiple levels of action: Foreground, middleground, and background action, and they are often seperated by the frames within the frames.
• Dolly across the action
• Use of long lenses
• Deep depth of field
• Action seen through frames - we really see this when we see the soldiers fire at Rambo through the frame of the mine shaft, which is a lot like shots in the Seven Samurai

Expansion of time is used very cleverly in this picture. It holds tension very effectively. One example of this is when we PAN with soldiers and stop on an open frame of rocks and a stream. We hold on this shot for a few seconds, and just when we are about to fall out of the story we see a hand raise up from the lake. Another good example of this, as well as Stallone's acting achievements in this movie, is when Rambo is sleeping and we hear Trautman over the radio. We hear him, and Rambo flinches a little as if he is just dreaming. He hears the voice again and suddenly wakes up. Then there is silence, while Rambo still thinks he may have been dreaming, and then the voice comes again and Rambo suddenly looks over to the radio.

There are also some interesting plays with the point of view used in this film. We see Rambo walk into his own point of view near the end of the movie, which is something Hitchcock liked to do, but we also sometimes PAN someone into their POV, as when Rambo first sees the Sheriff pull up, we think it is his point of view, then we PAN and Rambo is standing there right in his own point of view.

In the final moments of the movie Rambo runs off a tremendous speach, one that in my opinion has never been matched cinematically. First of all the delivery is meaningful and honest. Also because Trautman directly prior to this talks about this "War" that Rambo started on the town. Rambo starts talking about the war as well, only he is talking about Vietnam. At the end of it he pulls Trautman down and embrases him. All he really needed was one person to care for him.

One of the shots we see a lot in this film is Panning with the action. By this I mean for example a shot of a vehical coming towards us, then pan with it as it passes by and then moves away from us. This does a few things. for one it keeps us with the action, it also creates a dynamic- always moving frame, but above that, it also gives us a lot of scope, and allows us to see more of the world, and maybe believe that there is life beyond the edge of the frame.

Sound is annother important element in this movie. At times we see Stallone react to dogs in the distance that were obviously not there when it was shot. We also hear the sound of bullets firing when the gunshop is on fire. Even though we do not see the bullets flying we believe they are.

First Blood I find is one of those few modern movies you can watch and both enjoy, and learn something as well. Having watched and recorded every shot in the movie, I feel I have grown beyond what I thought I could just by seeing the film. If you like First Blood, I also reccomend watching Uncommon Valor, Seven Samurai and Notorious.