Sylvester Stallone made his 'Rambo' co-stars lie beside scorpions during filming.

The 61-year-old actor - who directs and stars in the fourth installment of the action franchise - expected his fellow actors to ignore ants, snakes and scorpions while shooting a key battle scene in a tropical jungle.

Graham McTavish - who plays a former SAS mercenary in the film - revealed: "There's a scene in the movie where I have to fire a gun from behind a tree stump. It was swarming with biting red ants which were actually on top of a nest of scorpions. I thought we would move to another location in case I got bitten or stung."

"But no, Sly was very no-nonsense and there was no way we were moving. Obviously we were in a jungle on the border of Thailand and Burma and we just had to deal with it."

"It wasn't just ants and scorpions we had to deal with - there were snakes all over the place too. One of the actors was nearly bitten on his leg."

McTavish also revealed it took him a while to adjust to working with legendary action hero Stallone.

He added to BANG Showbiz: "Of course it's surreal to be there standing next to Rambo, after you've seen and loved the first three movies."

"It did take me a couple of days to forget that it was him. You do forget eventually, because he's a nice guy, but there are not many people like him."