Standing face-to-face with a legend is a terrifying and yet deeply awesome experience as Rotten Tomatoes UK discovered last week as we shook the hand of Sylvester Stallone.



In London to promote "Rocky Balboa" – and you can read our interview on that right here – we couldn’t let him return home without finding out what the situation is for another of his iconic creations – John Rambo.

Just as Rocky Balboa puts the boxer in the ring for one final bout, so "Rambo IV: Pearl of the Cobra" is designed as the closing chapter in that series, and it’s due for release in 2008. “The idea of Rambo is kind of intriguing as a closing chapter,” Stallone told RT-UK, “When you shoot a film as a sequel to do another sequel it’s a whole other tone. But when you know it’s the final chapter you try and put in there as much emotion and understanding and closure as you can.”

Stallone also revealed that giving John Rambo closure was as important as doing the same for Rocky Balboa. “I thought, ‘I’m going to do John Rambo, I have to do it, and now I’ll try and make the best of it and bring out a really dark character.’ Whereas Rocky is a light character, and optimistic, Rambo has been up to his waist in blood for 30 years and guess what? Nothing is solved, the world’s still rough, the world’s still broken, so what does it all mean? It’s that kind of anger.”

The film sees Rambo hired by a group of Christian human rights missionaries so that he can protect them from pirates while on an humanitarian mission to Burma. “He lives in the Far East,” says Stallone, “So that’s going to be some kind of Joseph Campbell journey back home.”

But Stallone revealed that "Rambo IV" may be his last film in front of the camera. “I have very little aspirations about acting because I think that probably the best things have come and gone,” he told us, “I would like to focus on writing and directing. I wouldn’t turn down a good Mafioso part, let’s put it that way, but I love writing and directing right now, even though writing can be incredibly painful and lonely. I get great satisfaction from doing it.”

Rest assured RT-UK will keep you up to date with news on "Rambo IV" as it develops.