As filming on John Rambo gets underway, we’re getting juicy detail after juicy detail. The latest involves the badass who’s going to be opposing one John J. Rambo (please say the J) as he ends lives in the jungles of Myanmar. Apparently realizing that there are few forces in filmdowm much less humans that could credibly challenge the guy, the producers went the route of The Killing Fields and picked a real life guy to get the job done.
Sai Mawng, a retired ex-guerilla from the Shan State Army (basically the rebel forces of Burma), will make his bigscreen debut as….a badass Burmese officer. He beat out 300 or so applicants for the part, and when I say “beat,” I mean, he literally punched everyone else up for the role into molecules leaving the producers little choice but to hire him in the interest of everyone’s continued existence. Well, maybe.
I look forward to seeing the guy in action, even though he’s doomed to die a violent and applause-inspiring onscreen death. At least he and the other Shan refugees playing Burmese soldiers in the movie get a little Hollywood loving to brighten up the day. They live in a brutal, Europe-created country that’s been immersed in civil war for decades now. That earns them the right to cinematic immortality as Rambo’s latest ammunition tasters, I think.