Being true to my task of ranking each Rocky based on a rewatch, this one must be ranked as probably the worst 'Rocky'. It's extremely untrue to the series so far and works much better as a standalone 80s action film.

Why?

The ridiculously brutal fighting of III is ramped up to a Spinal Tap 11 here and it is, at best, uncomfortable viewing - and at worst, sickening.

But most of the movie is designed to detach you from reality with endless (admittedly great) songs and montages. For a 90 minute movie, at least 30 minutes is reused footage I'd say.

Ask most people what their favourite Rocky is and it's likely to be this one... Sadly that's because it's mindless music and action. It is actually the most un-Rocky and should have been reigned in for its 80s excesses.

So bad is the lack of believability that it has skewed the whole Rocky arc into dangerous territory that it is only the later Rocky Balboa and Creed that have managed to reign back even 10% of the damage.

It is a victim of the Cold War obsession that 80s American culture had. It is a sleight to Stallone that he thought he could impact the world using Rocky and Rambo - his ego must have been rampant during that decade.

My final word. Stallone is currently re-editing this film for a re-release... Done right that could flatter the arc of the Rocky saga and bring this movie back into line with reality in a way that the latter movies rightly deserve. He's spoken of taking the robot out and that bodes well that a fully recut version losing some of the cartoon violence in the fight as well as lengthening out the drama portion, could render a solid film from the carcass of this.


5.75/10 as a Rocky film.

It worked in the 80s. It doesn't work today.