FIRST OFF . . .

The final scenes of Sylvester Stallone’s “Rambo: First Blood Part III” were scheduled to have been shot early this morning in the California desert near the Arizona border. It brings an end to five months of filming in Israel, Thailand and the United States. The lengthy schedule prompted some of the crew to don “I Survived Rambo III” T-shirts in the last few weeks. The film was budgeted at $35 million but, according to some reports cost closer to $50 million. Reasons reportedly included a longer production schedule than anticipated, in part due to the firing of 40 crew members and the original director during a stay in Israel. The film, which is scheduled for May 25 release, now goes into post-production.