Will Rambo IV suck?

When I was 14 and weighed in at 9 1/2 stone I became a Stallone fan. I saw Rocky II, lying on the living room floor in front of the 21" TV that my parents had. Nobody in the room saw the tears streaming down my face when Adrian came out that coma.

The training montage and the run up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art became a piece of cinematic history.



From that moment on, mine and Sly's destinies would become intertwined, financially at least.

I bought Rocky III on VHS (when video tapes cost as much as a small car), I saw Rocky IV at the cinema the day it came out. I bought the Rambo poster book and had John J in various poses of mass murder, blu-tacked to my bedroom wall. I had the Rambo computer game for my ZX Spectrum and for breakfast I drank raw eggs mixed with milk until I was ill.

I was with Sly for the good times, wearing a dress and a beard in Nighthawks, jumping out of river to gut an unsuspecting Vietnamese's conscript and knocking the fuck out of Dolph Lundgren. These are our memories.

We share some regrets to. Sly made Oscar and I went to watch it.

I think thats enough talk of regret...

Over The Top, Stop Or My Mum Will Shoot, Daylight, Judge Dread and that time I shit myself at the Boys Brigade, these are the moments that have molded us into the people and the places we are now.

I have a son, who I'm guiding in the ways of the world, he's seen all the Rocky films and has some of the new action figures. One day, when he's older I'll introduce him to a psychologically damaged Vietnam vet with low body fat.

The new John Rambo movie will be awful if the teaser trailer is anything to go by.



However, sometime, years from now, there's a rainy Sunday afternoon where myself and my son will sit down to enjoy an old movie, it's going to have no plot, clunky dialogue and a scene where some gook gets his throat ripped out, thats become a piece of cinematic history.

'When your pushed, killing's as easy as breathing'