Three years before his 1976 breakout hit Rocky, Sylvester Stallone enjoyed his first lead role in a movie via 1973’s Rebel. Well, his first primary part in a “legitimate” movie, as he did star in 1972’s porno flick The Party at Kitty and Stud’s.

Set in the fall of 1969, anti-war protester Jerry Savage (Stallone) hitches a ride to New York to meet his pal Tommy Trafler (Antony Page). He travels with some hippies and becomes smitten by good-natured Laurie Fisher (Rebecca Grimes).

One he gets to the Big Apple, Jerry and Tommy connect with fellow radical Estelle Ferguson to promote their primary goal: terrorist operations against corporations they feel promote the war effort. This gets the FBI on their tail and also threatens Jerry’s burgeoning relationship with Laurie.

Going into Rebel, I wondered if the movie would offer obvious signs that Stallone possessed the talent and charisma to soon become a major movie star. That answer comes back a firm “nope”.

Not that Stallone does poorly in his role, as he offers the best performance of the bunch. However, that exists more as a reflection on the amateurish nature of his co-stars than it does an indication Stallone boasted clear talent in his first lead.

That said, Rebel seems so cheap and cheesy that even an Oscar-caliber turn from Stallone couldn’t save it. A clear product of its time, the film didn’t age well.

Of course, a movie can represent its era and still remain worthwhile 50-plus years later. Rebel lacks the talent to make it more than a laughable stab at counter-culture cinema.

Rebel feels like a flick created by people with no affinity for the subject matter who try to fake it. We get hippies and revolutionaries who seem almost comedic in their cliché nature.

My plot synopsis makes the tale here look a lot more concise than the actual end product we see. The filmmakers take an inherently simple story and make it a muddled mess.

At its heart, Rebel exists as a thriller about extremists who try to evade legal authorities and related complications. However, nothing about the movie follows a logical progression, so the final result fails to mesh.

Rebel comes with twists that intend to add spice. Instead, they feel desperate and gratuitous.

Nothing about the basics of Rebel doom the flick to failure. Unfortunately, poor execution makes it a dud.

Footnote: apparently the film originally ran as No Place to Hide but it got recut later as Rebel in a version that did more to highlight Stallone. The Blu-ray goes with the latter and seemingly the Hide edition no longer exists.

1990 also brought another revision that featured dubbed dialogue. A Man Called Rainbo reworked the flick for comedy. Too bad that one doesn’t appear here as a bonus.

Rebel appears in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. Though not a total disaster, the image suffered from some self-inflicted wounds.

The biggest issue stemmed from the rampant use of grain reduction techniques. Some scenes showed a bit of grain but most of the movie came with a plastic and smoothed-out appearance due to these methods.

This made the result look bland and flat, and it impacted sharpness. Some close-ups appeared fairly tight but an awful lot of the flick wound up as soft and mushy.

No issues with jagged edges or shimmering occurred, but edge haloes cropped up through the movie. Print flaws didn’t dominate but I saw occasional lines and marks.’

Colors tended toward bland blues and yellows. These lacked vivacity and seemed dull most of the time.

Blacks appeared decent – albeit somewhat inky – and shadows felt adequate. Too much heavy-handed processing turned this into a flawed presentation.

Though I strongly suspect Rebel came with monaural audio in 1973, the Blu-ray provided a DTS-HD MA 2.0 soundtrack. Don’t expect the mix to do a whole lot to open up the soundfield, though.

Music seemed “stereo-ish”. This meant the score and songs broadened to the sides in a general way but not with real separation.

On the other hand, effects cropped up in the left and right channels in a pretty specific manner, so the isolated in the channels without much clear blending. This left the soundscape as less than engaging but it seemed fine given the movie’s vintage and budget.

Audio quality seemed satisfactory, though I suspected some re-recorded elements. In particular, effects could appear more vivid and “modern” than they should.

Still, the track usually seemed fairly period appropriate, with speech that showed some edginess but remained intelligible and decent. Music offered reasonable range.

As noted, some effects felt more dynamic than they probably should, but these didn’t turn into a notable distraction. Overall, the audio never dazzled but it worked fine for a low-budget movie from 1973.

In addition to a trailer created for the film’s 2020s re-release, we get a 16-minute, 34-second featurette called Rebel Reborn. It offers info from co-writer/director Robert Schnitzer.

Hosted by Kathy Close and shot before a screening audience, we learn about locations, casting, his start in filmmaking and the development of Rebel, various versions of the movie and its remastering. I can’t figure out why Schnitzer wears a headband for the chat – an homage to Rambo? – but he provides some good information.

Only one reason exists to bother with 1973’s Rebel: its status as Sylvester Stallone’s first leading role in a movie. Otherwise, it becomes a dated and amateurish stinker. The Blu-ray comes with problematic visuals and adequate audio plus a featurette. Unless you feel a crushing need to see every Stallone movie, skip this bomb.