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The November 25th issue of Entertainment Weekly
contains an article rating the top 30 sports movie
dvds and stars.
Sly Stallone, Rocky and Rocky III
all earned top spots.
Here's what they had to say:
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4. Rocky [PG, 119
mins., 1976; MGM] HERE'S WHY: Hard
enough to take a 15-round beating from Apollo
Creed [Carl Weathers], soft enough to give Adrian
[Talia Shire] the bed the night before the big fight,
the
Philly southpaw is more character than most. With one shot
to prove he's not just another bum from the
hood, Sylvester Stallone faces the champ and does the
unthinkable, by Hollywood standards: He loses.
But he wins our hearts by going the distance [and remembering
Adrian's hat]. DID YOU KNOW? The
Italian Stallion's blow-by-blow of the bout weighed
in at 32 pages. EXTRAS The 2001special edition
features commentaries detailing every decision made in
the making of this Best Picture. FINAL SCORE
We'd all like to eat lightning and crap thunder for Mickey
[Burgess Meredith]. - Mandi Bierly
24. Rocky III [PG,
100 mins., 1982; MGM] HERE'S WHY:
Because it perfected the formula. Why have one
nigh-invulnerable black heavyweight when you can have two? Why
have one viscerally adrenalized fight
when you can have three? The story of the Italian Stallion's
defeat at the hands of and subsequent victory
over Clubber Lang - the only actually scary performance
of Mr. T's career - packs all the inspirational
triumph you look for in a Rocky flick [and a touch of
casual racism that you don't], but Rocky III's true gift
to sports cinema is the anatomically fetishized, borderline
homoerotic training sequence. That, and "The
Eye of the Tiger." EXTRAS We pity the DVD fools
who included nothing but a measly trailer. If we find
them, our prediction for the encounter? Pain. FINAL SCORE
Twenty notches below the first Rocky on our
list, but the most fun installment in the whole series. - Marc
Bernardin
SYLVESTER STALLONE Rocky
[1976] Rocky Balboa may be an outclassed palooka,
but he has the heart
of a champ, a virtue that Stallone portrays so convincingly
that he transformed his Philly underdog into an indellible
and enduring pop-culture hero. [See #4]
- The pic above is different
than the one with the article. - Craig
