Quentin Tarantino Rebooting a Sylvester Stallone Classic?

Could Quentin Tarantino be looking to reboot a classic Sylvester Stallone film? The director definitely has some ideas how it would go

By Tristan Zelden | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

sylvester stallone first blood rambo

Auteur filmmaker Quentin Tarantino, who has been behind Oscar-winning films like Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, Django Unchained, and Inglourious Basterds, has an idea to reboot the iconic action franchise Rambo that starred Sylvester Stallone. In an interview on The Big Picture podcast, he gave some details as to what he would do to remake the classic film.

First of all, the Quentin Tarantino remake would follow closer to the book than the Hollywood-ified version that most people have come to know. The source material, named First Blood like the movie, was written by David Morrell and published in 1972.

Secondly, the major hurdle to overcome for this hypothetical remake of the iconic Sylvester Stallone franchise would be to find an actor to take over the role of John Rambo. Quentin Tarantino had that covered during the interview as he had in mind that Rambo would be played by Adam Driver (Marriage Story) and Kurt Russell (The Thing) as Sheriff Teasle. Let’s just say he gets this in the works, and all went the director’s way, then it would be the first time for him working with Driver and a return for Russell. The latter has worked with Tarantino on plenty of projects like Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, The Hateful Eight, and Death Proof.

Quentin Tarantino praised David Morrell’s ability to write dialogue. If it is the dialogue that he likes, then it would be a great fit for the filmmaker. He is known for movies like Pulp Fiction, Django Unchained, and the previously mentioned projects that starred Kurt Russell. All are full of expositions with extreme violence to kick up the excitement. A take on the 1972 novel would fit his iconic style perfectly.

Quentin Tarantino went into detail about non-Rambo things as well. He also spoke about what he has been watching during quarantine and the future of watching movies during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 1980s were good for Sylvester Stallone. The Rambo movies were exploding, and when he returned for the role in 2008 for Rambo, the film still made a decent profit. 2019’s Last Blood performed the worst critically and commercially. As the franchise is at its lowest point, a reboot of some kind could be the right move. It is always an event for a Quentin Tarantino movie to release, plus he always gets a star-studded cast to fill the screen for audiences, so it could revitalize the IP.

quentin tarantino

For now, Quentin Tarantino is busy. He is currently promoting the novelization of Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, which you can hear him talk about during the podcast interview. The filmmaker continues his plans for a third Kill Bill as well. Most recently, he gave an update that he would like to see Maya Hawke (Stranger Things) star in it with her mother, Uma Thermon, to reprise her role. So far, nothing has been made concrete as the director and cast members of the established movies have been talking about it for years, but nothing has happened to make Kill Bill: Vol. 3 a reality. We will see if the Rambo idea has any legs sooner than later.