Say "YO Adrian" and everyone knows what you're talking about. Few movies have made the same impact on pop culture as the "Rocky" franchise. It turned Sylvester Stallone from a B and soft core porn movie star to a major box office draw. The film was made for around a million dollars and grossed more than 250 million. Amazingly that puts it to only number 7 on the list of best return on investment for films at least according to "The Numbers" but it's a little rough to compete with "Paranormal" with a minuscule budget of under 20K and a gross of almost 200 million. Rocky was a phenomenon and has stood the test of time, so far, very well. Most interesting to me is some of the back story and lesser known items about the movie. It was supposed to be a darker, or at least it was written that way originally, movie. Balboa threw the fight in the original screenplay because he didn't want to be part of the fight game any longer.
The movie was inspired by a fight between Muhammad Ali and Chuck Wepner. Wepner was given the opportunity to fight Ali for the championship. Wepner wasn't expected to show well at all and he was a plodding fighter much as Rocky Balboa was. Wepner almost went the distance but was TKO'd late in the 15th round. I've watched the video of that final round and Wepner is lucky Ali didn't hit him again like Tyson probably would have. Wepner was just plain done. Anyway...Stallone saw that fight and started to write "Rocky". The name was from Rocky Marciano but the story was about Ali vs. Wepner.
The movie's casting is interesting. At one point Susan Sarandon was considered to play Adrian but she was too good looking. Burt Reynolds, Robert Redford, Ryan O'Neal and James Caan were all suggested by the studio but Stallone successfully appealed to the producers to play the title role. I don't think any of those other actors on the list could have done the job as well. The part just fit Stallone I think. Answer this honestly: Could you imagine anyone else playing any of the major parts? What if Mickey wasn't the penguin (Burgess Meredith) or Paulie wasn't Burt Young? Does that mean the casting was that good or is it just we have grown used to it?
Rocky was the sleeper hit of 1976. It was nominated for ten Oscars and walked away with Best Picture, Best Director and Best Editing. You can say what you like about Stallone but he hit this one WAY out of the park both with his performance and his writing.
There are parts of the move that are better than others, of course. There's a scene where Rocky and a teenage girl are walking home which really has no relevance to the rest of the movie, but I suspect the director was looking for another reason to use his new cool steadicam. This wasn't the first movie to use a steadicam rig but it was close. But I dare anyone to not feel a tingle when you hear "Gonna Fly Now" by Tom Conti rise in volume as Rocky runs up the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. And remember this is more than 30 years after its making. The movie as a whole just works. Rocky is the quintessential underdog . He's a nice guy who finally gets a break and forgives all the slights around him from Mickey's plea to manage him to Paulie's treatment of him and Adrian. He's what everyone thinks they could be deep down.
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