Sylvester Stallone is not the first actor to play the role of Rambo in a movie… it was an action thriller that few moviegoers knew about 7 years ago.

According to many, Sylvester Stallone was not the first to play Rambo on film – almost! In fact, the first actor to bear this name on screen was Tomas Milian.

The story takes place in 1972, the year the novel was published. first blood (with the title Rambo in France) written by David Morrell. The work attracted the attention of the Cuban actor Milian, who made a name for himself in Italy thanks to spaghetti westerns such as The Last Face Face or Providence, but also in the detective genre The Ransom of Fear or Bandits in Milan. Fascinated by the story, he set out to make an adaptation of it.

remind you first blood It tells the story of the arrival of former Green Berets in a small American town, where the local sheriff ends up with a lone drifter causing dangerous tension.

Another Rambo

But the adaptation project was not realized: three years after the publication of the book, Tomas Milian He tried to convince the Italian producers to bring the story to the screen, without success. As Roberto Curti explains in the book Italian criminal filmography, 1968-1980 (via Collider), the actor finally abandons the idea of ​​following the novel to the end. However, he doesn’t want to give up his name completely: so his next character will be called Rambo.

This is what happens in Millian Rambo’s Blood Bracelets, directed by Umberto Lenzi. The plot is completely different: Rambo is an ex-biker cop who seeks revenge for the death of his friend, who was killed by two rival crime families.

The script has nothing to do with it first blood and more inspired by the spirit of Sergio Leone’s Westerns, where alliances and betrayals between successive gangs lead to ultimate destruction. In short, Morell’s only link to Rambo is the main character’s name, which was established by Milian.

Despite everything, the film was a real success in Italy, earning 1.5 billion lira at the box office.

novel only in 1982 David Morrell It would eventually be faithfully adapted into a film by Ted Kotchef Sylvester Stallone in the main role. The rest you know: Rambo was a huge success and spawned two sequels in the 1980s, before John Rambo (2008) and Rambo: Last Blood (2019) brought the famous veteran’s story to a close.

If you want to (re)discover Blood Bracelets, you’ll have to look to the potential DVD versions of the film. As for the Rambo saga, you can find it on various dedicated platforms, sometimes streaming or simply on VOD.