BEFORE: It turned out to be a rather smooth transition, from superhero movies to sports films - perhaps that's because I'm starting with boxing, and comic-book fights and boxing matches obviously share a few things...
I waited a long time for some premium channel to run this one, after watching Rocky III through V in a previous boxing chain - but none did. So I'm forced to watch a version with commercials that ran on FX, I can't imagine they chopped it up too bad, except for adding the breaks. Linking from "Here Comes the Boom", Henry Winker was also in "The Lords of Flatbush" with Sylvester Stallone (last seen in "Daylight").
THE PLOT: Rocky Balboa comes out of retirement to step into the ring for the last time and face the heavyweight champ Mason 'The Line' Dixon.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Rocky V" (Movie #517)
AFTER: This movie takes its sweet time, getting Rocky back into the ring - for a while it didn't even seem like the script had that destination in mind at all. The first half of the film shows Rocky visiting his wife's grave, telling boxing stories at his restaurant, embarrassing his son, and spending time with a woman who he knew when she was a little girl. Because that's not weird at all.
He's got plans to get back into boxing, possibly at the local level - why he doesn't spend time at a gym training other fighters, I have no idea. But the guy's looking pretty old at this point, especially when you see how much his son aged since the last film. His plan gets fast-tracked when ESPN runs a computer simulation to determine how Rocky, at his peak, would fare against the current heavyweight champion, and this sparks enough debate that the actual fight gets proposed.
It's considered an exhibition match, a glorified sparring contest, though I don't see how this works on a practical level for the boxers - "Punch the other guy, just not very hard?" But considering the knockout record of his opponent, it does make sense that people would question whether power beats endurance, or the other way around. Remember, Rocky always "wins" if he goes the distance.
So Rocky agrees to the fight - hey, it's not like he can get brain damage, because, seriously, how much brain is left at this point? And how much did he even start with? But a key element of every other "Rocky" movie is missing here - did someone forget about the importance of the training montage?
Also starring Burt Young (last seen in "Win Win"), Antonio Tarver, Geraldine Hughes (last seen in "Gran Torino"), Milo Ventimiglia (last seen in "Armored"), A.J. Benza, with cameos from Mike Tyson (last seen in "The Hangover Part II"), Frank Stallone and Michael Buffer (last seen in "Love & Other Drugs").
RATING: 4 out of 10 rounds (of course...)
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