rocky balboa

So over the Chrimbo period I watched a few films via rental and just generally.

The first was Rocky Balboa, which, rather amazingly, is the sixth film in the Rocky series.

The idea with this one is it's meant to be a proper end to the series. We catch up with Rocky with him having completely retired from boxing, as he's getting on a bit, and running Adrian's - a restaurant named after his recently deceased wife.

I think over the years I've seen all of the Rocky movies. Certainly I've seen the first two and the fifth ones, which are the better of the Rocky movies. The third and fourth, from memory, were fairly forgettable.

So I've seen them all, but I'm not really sure if I'm a fan.

I mean, I remember enjoying the first one and I seem to recall the fifth one had something about it, but I dunno. I think one of my main problems was that the character of Rocky never actually seemed all that good of a boxer to me.

Now to be fair I can't honestly claim to be anything of an aficionado when it comes to the pugilistic arts, but I'm pretty sure boxing is about more than simply absorbing as many of the other guy's punches with your face. This seemed to be Rocky's entire strategy - he punches me in the face until he gets tired and then I win.

From memory he didn't really even seem to guard himself properly in an attempt to prevent some of the bows making contact. He'd just stand there taking a pounding until the other guy was knackered.

Anyway, the idea behind this film is broadly one of Rocky making something of a comeback. The film features a modern boxer who's become hugely unpopular and in order to boost his popularity they put together a show fight.

Now this could have been extremely cheesy. It has actually happened in real life as I understand it, with old boxers coming back, and what they do here actually kinda makes sense.

They don't make it seem like the aging Stallone could really go toe-to-toe with the younger man, but they do create a few things that put them on more of a level playing field. But the key is how they end the film. I won't spoiler it, but there's actually an alternative ending on the disc that if they'd used that it would have undermined the whole film, so it's good they went the way they did.

The other clever thing is that there's much more of a focus on Rocky outside of boxing. The death of Adrian forms a core plot-thread, as does his relationship with his brother in law, Paulie.

There's also other non-ring plot threads and it's by focusing on these that make the film a good film, rather than purely a boxing film.

So yeah, I quite enjoyed it, though I still think it's a little daft that after all these years Rocky basically stands there taking the punches.