Rocky Balboa
Years after his retirement, the now widowed Rocky owns a restaurant named after his beloved Adrian. However, his relationship with his son is fractured, as Jr is constantly living in his dads “shadow”.
Still living in the mean streets of Philly, he has a chance meeting with Marie, one of the old street kids from before his fame, now a single mother herself. As a platonic friendship arises between them, Rocky treats them to care and empathy.
Meanwhile, the new “Champ” Mason Dixon, who has failed to find the support from his city, puts it to Rocky to have a bout of ‘who’ is the greatest? The retired champ? or the new kid on the block?
Direction
Stallone takes over the direction once again, and gives us a tender looking film with more heart than the previous entries. It is also less about boxing, more focusing on the relationships between characters – similarly to the first film.
Cast/Characters
Returning for their sixth appearance are of course Stallone as Rocky, and Burt Young as Paulie. Talia Shire does get ‘flashback ‘archive footage’ appearances, but opted not to return as she understood that the character did not need to appear in this iteration.
Tony Burton returns as Duke, but has a more backseat role this time.
Milo Ventimiglia takes over the role of Robert Jr from the late Sage Stallone.
Antonio Tarver (himself a real life world champ) plays Dixon.
Geraldine Hughes plays the role of Marie.
Breakdown
The film shows that Rocky is back to living in the ‘mean’ streets of Philadelphia, which I always found to be more grounded in realism. I liked how they made him the ‘underdog’ and when they made him rich, living the life of luxury – took away from the authenticity of the character.
Here, he is now widowed, with Adrian having passed several years prior. Paulie is still around, still the same cantankerous attitude, and wanting Rocky to move on from his grief. Rocky now owns a restaurant that he named after Adrian.
I didn’t really buy the customers who kept coming in and wanting to hear stories of the first fights between Rocky and Creed. 30 years would have passed since then. It was even sixteen years since 5 and this one. (Crazy to think there have been 19 years since this film and now!)
I loved the bringing back the character of ‘little Marie’ who had such a memorable moment in the first film. I was worried that they were going to bring this character in as a new love interest for Rocky, but grateful they just made her a friend (even laughing off the possibility that they would be more).
I found the inclusion of her son Steps, who Rocky takes a shine to – to compensate for his poor relationship with his son Robert, was done poorly. This did not need to be added, and the character added nothing to the end result of the film, where Rocky reconnects with Robert.
The character of Mason Dixon (played by then champ Antonio Tarver) is a poor mans Apollo Creed. He lacks Creed’s persona, and doesn’t have the screen presence of past performers like Carl Weathers, Dolph Lundgren, Mr T, or Hulk Hogan. This might also be in part to how his character was written, as he too has never found the support of his own city, despite being the new champ.
The idea of why the fight ‘should’ occur I quite liked, and is surprisingly technologically sound, even for 2006. This causes Rocky to want to fight, and brings back the great training montage (including the missed song Gonna Fly Now).
Even at a tight 95m the build up to the fight between Rocky and Dixon takes a little long, but where it drags it is assisted by one of the better screenplays. There is great dialogue moments between Rocky and the other characters, Robert, Marie and Paulie.
Overall
I really enjoyed this, and found the more solemn story-line wonderfully handled. Rocky’s ongoing devotion to Adrian, and the well written narrative has this on par with the first two films. Much improvement from 3-5.
4/5