Rocky Balboa

I pity the fool who won't like this movie. Even if you didn't grow up watching the Rocky movies you will still enjoy this story. Doing the series great justice, Rocky Balboa who was written and directed by Sylvester Stallone, goes back to its roots as being more of a story of personal struggles and triumph rather than just a boxing match. This is what made Rocky I in 1976 an academy award winning movie. One thing that puts this one above the first few would be the cinematography and fight scenes.

One of the most pleasing aspects of this movie is that it creates a new ending to the Rocky story and leaves the Rocky 5 ending in the dust. Rocky 5 wasn't a big crowd pleaser. There were a few of the old characters in this final installment - Paulie (Rocky's best friend) and Duke (Apollo's trainer). We don't think we are spoiling anything by saying that during this movie Rocky is having to deal with the passing away of Adrian who was his inspiration and life. A new character was introduced not necessarily in place of Adrian but to serve as an encouragement to Rocky and she does happen to be a female. This was not as much a romantic connection as it was a good friendship.

We were very impressed with the training Sly had to go through to get his body back into boxing worthy shape. He really put on a great deal of mass and he looked better than George Foreman did the last time he was in the ring. It is hard to believe that Sly is as old as he really is after watching this movie. As with the first few Rocky's, Rocky made several off-the-wall statements and comments that made you laugh.
Paulie of course being his normal self with his "hate the world" grumpy old man attitude makes for a few laughs as well.

We give this movie four out of five stars. It was very "kid friendly" with its lack of foul language and sexual content. It was your typical Rocky "feel good" movie that left you leaving the theatre happy and encouraged. It was a great final chapter to the Rocky story!