A “John Rambo” origin movie has been in the works for a couple of years, based on the character created by author David Morrell in his novel “First Blood,” which saw Sly Stallone portray the nomadic veteran soldier dealing with PTSD while being abused by a local police force.
Now, thanks to Deadline, there is a big casting update as actor Noah Centineo (“The Recruit”) is reportedly in the mix to play this new iteration of Rambo, taking the mantle from Stallone as the new project from “Sisu” director Jalmari Helander would explore Rambo’s transformation into one of the best special forces commando to be every produced by the American military and executing a string of covert missions throughout the Vietnam War.
One of the recurring aspects of Rambo’s past in the films was being a prisoner of war and victim of repeated torture, leading to painful flashbacks. This informed the character’s reasoning in “Rambo: First Blood Part II” (co-written by James Cameron and Stallone) to agree to go on a dangerous black ops mission in an attempt to locate long-forgotten P.O.W.s left behind (based on a theory of the era that missing-in-action American soldiers were still being illegally held captive in the 1980s).
Millennium Media is behind the latest “Rambo” pic but still needs a distributor, with the report mentioning that Lionsgate may get involved, as the two previously partnered on the last Stallone romp “Rambo: The Last Blood” and the superior 2008 installment, “Rambo.”
Production on “John Rambo” expected to begin this fall in Thailand (doubling for Vietnam), the lush Southeast Asian location is rising in popularity for Hollywood projects, which was recently used for shows such as HBO‘s “The White Lotus” and Noah Hawley‘s “Alien: Earth” alongside recent Gareth Edwards films “The Creator” and “Jurassic World Rebirth.” However, the outlet mentions the filming start isn’t entirely a lock, just yet.
Centineo is shooting Legendary‘s “Street Fighter” remake next from director Kitao Sakurai (“Butterfly,” “Bad Trip”) and is said to be playing a version of Ken in the martial arts video game adaptation. This wouldn’t be Centineo’s first military role as he was recently part of the cast of the Alex Garland co-directed pic “Warfare.”
- Christopher Marc
- Christopher Marc
- Christopher Marc
- Christopher Marc
- Christopher Marc
- Christopher Marc
