ABSTRACT
The right-wing films, especially Rambo:First Blood II, most clearly demonstrate the strategy of mythic substitution or displacement in the use of an oft-repeated rumor: that American military personnel missing in actions are being held captive in Southeast Asia. Colonel Trauptman, Rambo's Special Forces commander and surrogate father-figure, reminds Murdock that the United States reneged on reparations to the Vietnamese, who retaliated by keeping the unransomed captive Americans. The film opens with an explosion of rock at a quarry. Colonel Trauptman arrives to recruit Rambo for a special mission. The reliance on the captivity narrative and Indian iconography evidences a desperate impulse to disarticulate a sign—the Vietnam veteran—from one meaning to another, the Noble Savage. The male body as weapon functions as a bulwark against feelings of powerlessness engendered by technology, minority rights, feminism—this helps explain the film's popularity not only in the US but overseas as well, where it similarly appealed to working-class, male audiences.
