ROCKY IV Directors Cur Screening in November

[AndyDursin]

Paulie's robot is hitting the cutting room floor apparently.

Will be interesting to see what else Sly does here since IV is the leanest and most superficial entry in the entire series.

[mkaroly]

Entertaining film for what it is. Truth be told, of the ROCKY series I have only seen the first film (either the whole thing or bits and pieces of it) and ROCKY IV (the whole thing). Never watched any of the rest of them as far as I can remember. Always liked his Rambo character more.

[AndyDursin]

IV is extremely slick and was a total crowd-pleaser, though in terms of running time and character development, it's an outlier -- very much a 90-minute music video (with some great songs, of course!).

ROCKY BALBOA was nearly as good a revisitation of the character as the 2008 RAMBO was. Very solid. And both CREED films are worthwhile too.

Actually if you liked ROCKY IV I don't know how you've never seen III -- which is better and very entertaining too!

II I always thought was too long and contrived, and V was a nice attempt to get back to the character's start (and the series' start) after IV but didn't entirely come off.

[mkaroly]

I don't know what it is...I just never found Rocky to be that compelling of a character. IV was a product of its time and I saw it when I was young so that has a lot to do with my nostalgic appreciation of the film. For whatever reason I always thought Rambo was way more interesting and compelling. I applaud Stallone for his portrayal of both characters though - much respect!

[Edmund Kattak]

I saw IV in the theater in 84 and thought it was short and superfluous. I've never watched it again. Very curious, though, to see what Stallone meant by "soulful" to see if there was more meat and drama left out that could flesh this movie up a notch in terms of dramatic development. I am receptive if this shapes up to be more dramatically weighted, as opposed to a superficial "message" movie popcorn chewer.

[AndyDursin]

That's what I'm interested in -- was there any movie there to begin with? It's such a rote cinematic exercise, and such a departure from where the character began. It also makes next to no effort to develop and craft a story...it's all "the good stuff" (boxing, training montages, etc.), unless there WAS a lot left on the cutting room floor. Guess we'll find out, but I like the fact MGM indulged Stallone -- with nothing else to do during this COVIDcrisis, why not?

[AndyDursin]

[AndyDursin]

John Herzfeld's feature length doc on the creation of the Directors Cut is up on YouTube: