Score: 8.0 (out of 10)
Director: Sylvester Stallone
Distributors: Revolution Studios, Columbia Pictures, MGM
MPAA Rating: PG
One last hurrah. One last challenge. One last trip down memory lane. Those are what the sixth and final installment of Rocky is all about. And cheers all around for how well done it is.
The first Rocky came out 30 years ago and took the world by storm, winning the Best Picture Oscar. Who doesn't know Bill Conti's inspiring theme music, "Gonna Fly Now," and the famous run up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art? In a sense, this last Rocky film is a victim of its predecessors' legendary status. All the familiar themes pioneered by this series - the will of the underdog to fight on against all odds, the grit and heart of a champion, the crucial support of friends and lover along the way - are all here again.
But the epic scale of previous films is gone, replaced by a more down-to-earth, warm account of someone past his prime dealing with the loss of his wife Adrian (Talia Shire) to cancer and being long past his prime himself. Stallone is, after all, 60 now (though still in good physical shape, despite a rather nasty veiny side on his chest from an earlier pec injury). It is nice that two regulars in the series, Paulie (Burt Young) and Tony Evers (Tony Burton) are still around to join the cast. New characters are also nicely woven into a major theme, that life is the greatest fight of all. That idea is reflected in his son's struggles in the corporate world and in his helping, for a second time, a girl turned single mother living in poverty get back on her feet. In the end, the expected happy ending is still glorious, because regardless of all else, he has done what he was born to do, fight his fight.
So even if the film's climax fight scene doesn't feel as epic as the older Rocky's (in my case, maybe from all those equally fake WWE fights I've grown up watching), the Balboa character is just as powerful as ever to tug at your heart, to encourage every viewer to get back up and finish the round, no matter which one it happens to be.
Comments