When I was going through the Dirty Harry movies last month, my eye kept being caught by the brightly colored icons for the Rocky movies, and I promised myself that I'd tackle those next. Which is lucky, because it turns out that they're all leaving HBO Max at the end of April. It's been an instructive experience so far (I just finished Rocky III), watching Sylvester Stallone (and Rocky Balboa, of course) go from loser to world star.
I'm always taken by the story behind the original Rocky movie, which is that Stallone got the idea for it from spending his last few dollars to attend a boxing match. He wrote the script, starred in it, and it took off to an extent nobody was expecting. I was too young to watch the movies when they came out in theaters, apart from the sixth one, Rocky Balboa, but I was always aware of them, because kids at school were talking about Ivan Drago or there were commercials for them.
The other thing that sticks with me about the movies is that Rocky represented a sort of "Great White Hope" that appealed to America in the era of Black heavyweight champions, and especially Muhammad Ali, who was pretty controversial. For one thing, it's hard not to see Ali in Apollo Creed, the flashy and quick-tongued champion who fights Rocky in the first two films, and then becomes his buddy.
If you look at the movies through this racial lens, you can see a similar narrative at work in Rocky III, where he fights Clubber Lang (played by Mister T), who's portrayed in a pretty unflattering light, especially when he makes crude remarks about Rocky's manhood to Rocky's wife. It's there in the training montage, when Apollo takes Rocky to LA to train in the gym where he came up, and Rocky's friends are horrified at being around a bunch of Black people.
I've never seen the fourth movie, but I expect you can read the Great White Hope narrative into that one too, as the Black boxer, Apollo, isn't enough to beat the USSR's champion Ivan Drago, and dies in the ring, so that Rocky has to avenge him. In any case, I can report back on that once I've seen the actual film.
This blog got heavy fast, so I'll switch to another thing that struck me as I was watching the movies. Stallone's performance is really charming in the first two films, as he plays Rocky as a lovable lunk who has hidden depths. The actual fights are relatively unimportant in those movies, taking up only about half an hour at the end, but instead we get to see him woo Adriene and grapple with the turn his life has taken. There are also nice scenes showing how his stardom has affected those around him, like his friend Paulie.
It also struck me that when I'm watching Rocky, I'm not thinking back to the Rambo movies (which happen to be the only other serious exposure I've had to Stallone). I consider this to be the mark of a really good actor, especially when he's not changing his appearance drastically between roles. The other example I use is Harrison Ford, who is completely different as Han Solo compared to Indiana Jones and Jack Ryan.
As I said, I'm only halfway through the main Rocky series, so I still have Rocky IV and Ivan Drago to consider. It does feel a little silly to consider that Stallone thought he could make some political point with that film, but it'll be fun to see brainless 80s propaganda - and maybe there'll be some interesting stuff beyond the flag-waving?
Of course, once I finish these films, I'll be on the lookout for the Creed movies, starring Michael B Jordan as Apollo's son Adonis. I'm looking forward to those too, because they've got much better reviews than any of the main Rocky films except the first.
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