Rocky in Review, Part 4: Why Rocky Balboa Is an Lifelong Favorite
Looking back at a movie I've adored since 2006
On Thursdays for the foreseeable future, I’ll be publishing reviews of classic movies, pieces that have never appeared here before taken from my book 200 Reviews, available now in Paperback or on Kindle (which you should really consider buying, because it’s an awesome collection!). For our first set of films, we’re looking at the Rocky series, continuing today with the last entry of the original series, Rocky Balboa.
Rocky Balboa - 2006, Dir. Sylvester Stallone
Originally written March 7th, 2023, incorporating an excerpt written December 2006
Story time: The first Top 10 list I ever made was for the best films of 2006, when I was 14 and still in Middle School, and I named Rocky Balboa the best film of that year. I think that was the year I first got into the Rockymovies, and this one really took me aback at the time. I'd been writing about films for a while at that point for The Denver Post's Colorado Kids section, and was just starting my own blog on the Post's community journalism site YourHub. 2006 and 2007 were really the key years that opened my eyes to the power of movies long term. But man, there was something special about Rocky Balboa to me – just the quiet seriousness with which Stallone returned to this world, and the simple but forceful way the film tied together the core perseverance ethos of the entire series. I was passionate about it. Here’s what I wrote about the film in that Top 10 list back in 2006:
Stallone’s final entry in the Rocky series is the best since the first, released 30 years ago in 1976. While not better than the original, the way it mirrors the themes and plot of the first film is spectacularly done, and has you rooting for good old Rocky right until the end. You don’t see a movie like this anymore. There are no big special effects, no stupid action scenes, and no unnecessary crudeness. Just lots and lots of heart, and that’s the best kind of film.
A few months after I wrote that piece, I applied to go to the Denver School of the Arts' film program; it was a kind of prestigious arts-focused school in downtown Denver, and I had a chip on my shoulder feeling like I was too smart for the shitty public schools I'd been attending in Golden. I had a portfolio of my written work I submitted to show off my love of film, and I remember in the interview the teacher who led that department challenging me on the choice to put Rocky Balboa at the top. I also had Alfonso Cuarón's Children of Men on there, which he evidently thought was the actual artistic choice, and he talked to me like I was some kind of country bumpkin for ranking Rocky at #1 over the serious end-of-the-world drama. I could tell I wasn't getting into the school right then and there – I still remember the patronizing, elitist venom of that entire line of questioning, how demeaning it was. If I'd put the 'artsier' film at #1, would I have gotten in?
Ah, who knows? Here's what I do know:
1) Rocky Balboa may have helped me dodge a bullet, because I made some important lasting friendships at the local public school I wound up going to instead, and in hindsight I'm glad things went the way they did. There’d be no Weekly Stuff Podcast or Japanimation Station if Sean Chapman and I hadn’t bonded over lunchtime chats about video games and anime.
2) I'm on the verge of getting my Ph.D. in film studies from the great University of Iowa, so, you know, joke's on that asshole.
3) Rocky Balboa still slaps.
I love this movie. It's often said about Rocky Balboa that while it's a good concluding chapter – a much better one than Rocky V – it doesn't reinvent the wheel or add anything new. I don't know if I disagree with that, but I definitely wouldn't frame it as a negative. In a lot of ways, this film goes back to basics; it's smaller-scale, more intimate, more sober than Rocky III, IV, or V, with a much smaller budget to match. It revisits locations, narrative beats, and themes from the first film, but I think it does so with a smart and soulful purpose. If the original Rocky was about proving one's worth as a young man no one has yet noticed, then this one provides a bookend by asking the question on the other end of life. The magic of these movies, when they're working, is always about finding a story to tell around and through the boxing. This one's got that in spades, with the idea that Rocky doesn't really know how to live anymore, with Adrian gone and the world passing him by. It's about staying relevant, not so much to the world, but to yourself – finding a reason to stay alive when a lot of what made life worth living has disappeared. Boxing is the crucible he returns to in order to figure that out, just as boxing was the thing he self-actualized through on the way up. It's great stuff, it feels honest, and it's what a good sequel should be - an answer to a call made in an earlier chapter, brought forward in time and evolved in complexity.
I love how much Philly is a character in this movie, moreso than in any Rocky film since the original. You just get a real sense of place, of how Rocky exists in this world. How the city regards him as this local legend, not just because of the boxing, but because he's such a part of the community. A lot of the film is just watching him move through these spaces, talking to people, being a decent hometown guy, showing off a gregariousness that was there all the way back in the first film, and has aged well with time. But you also see the darker flip side of that, of this city being a cage of memories, of nostalgia that's curdled now that Adrian's gone and the physical symbols of their time together are being torn down or otherwise decaying. The moments of Rocky wandering through the spaces of his memories are striking, and it's an interesting counterpoint to the nostalgia-driven trend of the 'legacy sequel' that came up in Hollywood in the years after this movie, where that kind of nostalgia often isn't painted as sad or limiting, but celebratory. I think Stallone got it right here.
There are a lot of narrative choices I love, like bringing back 'little Marie' from the original film as an adult, someone for Rocky to bounce off of because building up the self-worth of others was always what he was best at. Those scenes don't necessarily build towards anything revelatory; there's never any contrived conflict between Rocky or Marie or her son, and while Rocky and Marie share a kiss near the end, it isn’t really played as romantic. It's all just a series of nice moments, of real human connection, and that's enough. I like that.
I also like Punchy the dog – he’s a good dog, it makes sense Rocky would adopt a mangy unloved mutt, and he’s the star of the big training montage, running around Philadelphia with Rocky in a matching doggy hoodie. Good boy.
There are a few weird narrative choices, too. "Mason 'The Line' Dixon" is indeed a baffling name for a character on a couple of levels, from the weirdness of anyone naming their kid 'Mason Dixon' to that kid then making the reference to the Mason Dixon Line explicit in their boxing career. I think if you squint you can head-canon something here about Mason's image being crafted by these two slimy white promoters who clearly don't give a shit about him, and that they probably chose this name for him without giving it much thought – but I don't know if Stallone put that much thought into it. It also feels like there's maybe a narrative step missing between Rocky choosing to fight again and then getting in the ring with Dixon, when he initially planned to just do some local matches for fun. If the film had a bit more money to play with we might have seen some of that (this film was made for a much smaller price tag than the last few films, especially considering 2006 dollars versus 1980s dollars), but as it stands, it seems like Rocky would probably want to throw a punch or two before stepping in the ring with the current heavyweight champ.
When he does step into the ring, though – damn, it's a terrific fight. Stallone chose to shoot this like it was an actual HBO pay-per-view event, complete with the clip packages and everything, something all three Creedfilms would borrow for the opening minutes of their climactic fights before segueing into a more traditionally cinematic style. Stallone sticks with it longer, though, and ups the level of verisimilitude in a couple of ways, including letting the fight play out more improvisationally, with a wider array of coverage, and trading some real blows with Anthony Tarver as Dixon. The fight looks good and plays really well, and just in a meat-and-potatoes, blow-by-blow sense, I think this is probably the best bout in the 9-film Rocky Extended Universe. There are others that are more cinematically accomplished or rousingly emotional, and Stallone gets a bit too hyperactive with stylistic choices in the mid-fight montage sequence, but for the rounds we see play out in full at the beginning and end, there's an unvarnished immediacy to this that's really exciting, and makes Rocky's unlikely late-in-life comeback feel all the more tangibly spectacular.
More than anything, I think what makes this film work is Stallone's tremendously charming performance. He's one of those actors that can have real, palpable chemistry with anyone, and he really puts that quality to good use here. He's always at his best playing characters who are a little more down on their luck or put upon, and having Rocky saddled with grief and age makes his performance come alive in a way it doesn't in some of the other Rocky sequels. Really, this performance has only gotten better with age – his work in Creed and Creed II is even more impressive.
The ending, like the rest of the film, doesn't reinvent the wheel – it's the same idea as the first Rocky, reframed and recontextualized – but it's perfect. Rocky loses in a split decision, like in the original film, but he doesn’t care; in this one, he isn’t even listening. He walks out of the arena celebrating with the fans and his collection of family and friends, and it couldn't possibly feel like more of a victory, because the challenge was, as always, about going the distance. That’s the note Rocky started on, and it's right for it to come back around to that idea in the end. Rocky becoming the 2-time Heavyweight champ is great and all, but this? This is more satisfying than a thousand Clubber Lang or Victor Drago defeats.
NEXT WEEK: We finish our ‘Rocky in Review’ series by looking at the three Creed films starring Michael B. Jordan.
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