Rocky Week Part 6

After “Rocky 5,” no one even thought that there would be another sequel, and Stallone himself denied of any plans. In the 90s, the series was laid to rest, but the first half of the 2000s proved that things change, ideas mature and as the movie’s tagline says, “It ain’t over tell it’s over.” As soon as the movie was announced, the jokes started kicking in. However, it was nice that in 2006, “Rocky Balboa” came out for those who wanted to see the series with an adult perspective. Plus, Stallone is back in the directing chair.

You could be disappointed that this movie does not start out the same way the others did, which started with a recap of the previous movies. However, to call it “Rocky Balboa,” lets it stand on its own. Although if I remember correctly, I think there are flashbacks that are shown from all five movies.

The movie starts off with Rocky at a cemetery sitting in front of Adrian’s grave. She has passed on and you can see in the movie the pain that Rocky is going through since she was the only girl he loved. This brings Rocky back to basics, and he's also growing distant from his son, played by Milo Anthony Ventimiglia from the show “Heroes,” who is working in one of the modern Philadelphia buildings, which is a perfect decision that Stallone made.

Rocky now runs a restaurant under Adrian’s name while telling customers his boxing stories and spends his free time walking around Philadelphia reflecting on his boxing days. I know he did that in the last movie, but Stallone hated that so this movie acts like 5 never existed. It’s hard to start a movie with this sad tone, but this is right for the series because if you love the franchise, it will draw you in. You feel sentimental for this character so you can imagine if you were in his place.

Paulie is still bitter and working in his meat factory, but does eventually get laid off and spends more time with Rocky. Duke is also back in this movie, and he hasn’t lost his funny edge at all. If you remember in the first movie when Rocky walked Marie home but she told him off, she is back in this movie, now played by Geraldine Hughes. You can find it disturbing when in the first movie when he asked her if she had a boyfriend, and now she is kissing him, especially since she has a son, played by James Francis Kelly III. However, she brings him a picture of Adrian and this proves that Rocky is still in love with her and no one can replace her.

Now the plot to this movie is that a computer-generated fight shows Rocky winning a match against current boxing champion, Mason “The Line” Dixion, played by real-life boxer Antonio Tarver. Everyone gets curious if that could happen, Mason gets furious and wants to fight him, and people start approaching Rocky about the fight. He decides to go back, but his son doesn’t want him to do that, which he gives an inspirational speech that “Life ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.” This is one of my favorite speeches in any movies. We don’t want him to step in the ring especially since we haven’t seen him box since the fourth movie and we are concerned for him. Speaking of which, he’s stepping back in the ring, but what happened to his bad eye and his brain damage? Why do they keep writing off his injuries?

This proves how unlikely this movie was going to be made. Many people didn’t even want to see this just because Stallone was 60 at the time. Wow, that’s a nice excuse. It’s not like he is aware of this and even refers to this in the public conferences. The age is the main force of this movie, he’s not trying to act young like a lot of old actors try to do. This movie is very much like the first one, where in that one Rocky was the underdog trying to rise to the challenge; here he is trying to make a comeback while ignoring all of the jokes proving that life is too short to be worrying about what others think. This is depressing, but it does lift your spirits and makes you feel good. He even makes a speech in front of court to argue on getting his license back, which is another great speech. This is no coincidence since he’s putting his real-life experience into his passionate monologues.

The reason why this movie was made was not for the success, but because Stallone really wanted to make it and put in genuine effort. It didn't come from the hands of people who wanted money, but from the man’s heart that had a difficult time trying to make this movie.

This movie does have a send off to the original song by Bill Conti’s Gonna Fly Now when he was training. At least we get the original to send this movie off with, even though Survivor came back in 2006, and their songs fit perfectly with these movies.

Lastly, we got to talk about the fight. It’s the best. I like that Mason is not shown as your typical Rocky villain, where all of them were over the top, he seems more down to Earth. He’s tough, but fair. This film's boxing match feels like a real HBO match. It’s shot in HD, you get all the stats shown, Michael Buffer is announcing it, it’s like watching a real boxing match. All of the punches are real, and Stallone suffered by making Antonio Tarver punch him repeatedly in the face. Stallone wanted to capture the realism of the movie and to do that was to make actual contact. This is the most realistic fight out of all the Rocky fights and probably the best.

If you can get over the fact that Stallone is old, you have to see this movie. It’s the best sequel in the series and one of the best comebacks of all time, filling in a 16 year gap. I highly recommend it. 

However, we are not done with the series. Tomorrow I will be looking at the latest entry in the series, “Creed,” which will be the finale to “Rocky Week.”