Dawn breaks over a prison quarry. A shackled John Rambo hefts stone, his breath fogging in the cold air. Here, Colonel Sam Trautman offers a deal: a pardon in exchange for a single reconnaissance mission in Vietnam. Across a briefing table, Marshall Murdock lays out the terms with a bureaucrat’s hollow smile—find proof of prisoners of war, and do not engage. The performances are a masterclass i...
