Editing First Blood (section)

=== Development ===
{{Quote box |align=right |quoted=true |salign=center |width=20em |The original Rambo was so bloodthirsty... the story was so hard, so terrifying every step of the way. (I think that's one reason the book took so long to get done). What I did with Rambo was try to keep one foot in the Establishment and one foot in the outlaw or frontier image. I wanted him to be accepted by the mainstream—but also be a criminal. So he has some strong patriotic views—and he loves the system. He just doesn't like a lot of the people who live and work in it.|source=Sylvester Stallone, 1985<ref name=":0" />}}

In 1972, [[Lawrence Turman]] at [[Columbia Pictures]] bought the film rights to ''First Blood'' for $175,000. [[Richard Brooks]] was slated to direct, and intended to have the film be an allegory on differing American perceptions of [[World War II]] and [[Vietnam veteran|Vietnam War veterans]], with Sheriff Teasle portrayed more sympathetically than in the novel. The film would have ended with Teasle ordering his men to drop their guns to try to reason with Rambo, who would have then been fatally shot by an unknown assailant. Brooks planned to start shooting ''First Blood'' in New Mexico in December 1972.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|title=First Blood|url=https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/56779|access-date=June 17, 2021|website=catalog.afi.com}}</ref> The film did not proceed because the Vietnam War was still underway and Brooks left the project.{{citation needed|date=June 2022}}

Afterward, [[John Calley]] purchased the rights at [[Warner Bros. Pictures]] for $125,000 with the thought of casting either [[Robert De Niro]] or [[Clint Eastwood]] as Rambo. A screenplay was written by [[Walter Newman (screenwriter)|Walter Newman]] with [[Martin Ritt]] intended to direct. The film would have criticized American military culture and portrayed Colonel Trautman as the film's villain, ending with both Rambo and Teasle dying. [[Sydney Pollack]] and [[Martin Bregman]] also considered directing the film, with Bregman hiring [[David Rabe]] to write a script. After Bregman departed [[Mike Nichols]] considered directing Rabe's script.

William Sackheim and Michael Kozoll wrote the screenplay that would be the basis of the final film in 1977, originally intending for [[John Badham]] to direct. Producer [[Carter DeHaven]] purchased Sackheim and Kozoll's script from Warner Bros. for $375,000. DeHaven secured the Cinema Group as a financer and hired [[John Frankenheimer]] as director with production to begin in [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]. This was also the first version of the script in which Rambo survived the film. However, the project stalled again after the distributor [[Filmways]] was acquired by [[Orion Pictures]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite news|last=Broeske|first=Pat H.|date=November 25, 1985|title=The Curious Evolution of John Rambo: How He Hacked His Way Through the Jungles of Hollywood|page=AB32|work=[[Los Angeles Times]]|publication-place=Los Angeles}}</ref>

After [[Mario Kassar]] and [[Andrew G. Vajna]] of Anabasis Investments read the book, they got interested in doing an adaptation as the first production of their studio [[Carolco Pictures]] funded by "in-house sources". They purchased the film rights from Warner Bros. for $375,000 and Sackheim and Kozoll's script for $125,000 in 1981.<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{cite web|url=https://deadline.com/2016/05/carolco-pictures-mario-kassar-cannes-interview-foxtrot-six-audition-1201752739/|title=Deadline Disruptors: King Of Cannes Mario Kassar On The Glory Days Of Carolco, Why Buying Arnie A Plane Made Sense & Talking Vaginas|first=Ali|last=Jaafar|publisher=Deadline|date=May 12, 2016|access-date=December 31, 2021}}</ref> [[Ted Kotcheff]], who had been involved in the project in 1976, returned after Kassar and Vajna offered to finance one of his projects. Kotcheff offered the role of John Rambo to Sylvester Stallone, and the actor accepted after reading the script through in a day.<ref name="drawing">{{cite video|title=Drawing First Blood|location=''First Blood'' DVD|year=2002|publisher=Artisan}}</ref>

Various scripts adapted from Morrell's book had been pitched to studios in the years since its publication, but only Stallone's involvement prompted its production. The time since the end of the Vietnam War and Stallone's star power after the success of the [[Rocky (film series)|''Rocky'' films]] enabled him to rewrite the script to make the character of John Rambo more sympathetic. Morrell's book has Rambo kill many of his pursuers, and Kozoll and Sackheim's draft had him killing sixteen people, but in the movie Rambo does not directly cause the death of any police or national guardsmen. Stallone also decided to let Rambo survive the film, unlike in the book. A suicide scene was filmed but Kotcheff and Stallone opted to have Rambo turn himself in at Trautman's urging.<ref name="drawing" /> Stallone did an estimated seven revisions of the script. Kotcheff requested further work be done on the script, which was performed by [[Larry Gross]] and [[David Giler]].