Review of Rocky (1976) by Tanner P — 21 Mar 2018

Rocky, a story of a poor boxer that doesn't have much gets a shot at the world heavyweight title against the world champion Apollo Creed. Rocky Balboa starts the movie working as a debt collector in run down Philadelphia, who's trying to make it big time in the boxing arena. Struggling to do so, his coaches, friends and employees fail to give him the time of day. When Apollo Creed, Heavyweight Champion of the World, comes to Rocky looking for a chance to turn a "nobody" into a "somebody". The match is suppose to be an easy fight for the champ, but the Rocky "The Italian Stallion" Balboa takes this fight as his only shot to make it big time, and gives Apollo a run for his money. This storyline is one reason that Rocky is considered one the the greatest movies on the 1970's and I believe that it is one of the greatest ever. This movie is an all time great because of the amazing storyline and the emotional connection you feel towards the characters, the incredibly small budget they had to produce this movie and all of the awards that Rocky has won.

The story of a poor man, who becomes rich and gets the the girl, might sound cliche but it feels far from it due of the emotional connection that pulls the audience in. In the review of rocky by Roger Ebert, a creditable critic, says the reason that this movie is great is because the audience feel connected (Ebert,1976). A movie with a good storyline and a bad connection with the audience is a bad movie, a movie that connects to the audience but has a bad storyline is also a bad movie, Rocky has an amazing storyline and the audience feels to be apart of the story. Roger Ebert also states that movies from the 70's lacked that emotional side, so rocky sort of came during a "emotional drought". The movie audience loved this movie when it came out because they felt something that the haven't felt in a while, a love for the characters. This emotional side of the movie helps put rocky on the all time great list because people remember how they felt watching this movie and the feel to be apart of the movie.

Rocky is one of the most successful movies of all time with a cumulative world wide gross of over two-hundred twenty-five million dollars. To put that into perspective The Terminator, a movie made around the same time as rocky, and still considered a successful movie made forty million in sales. A reason that Rocky's two-hundred twenty-five million dollars in sales is so impressive is because of their budget on the movie. Rocky was produced with less than a million dollars. Terminator was produced with over six million dollars. The producers of Rocky had to take a mortgage on their homes to come up with money to produce this movie. Rocky also didn't have any really big and famous actors in the movie at the time, so because of that they didn't have to pay them too much money. Just like the movie, these actors were looking for their chance to make it big time and this movie was their chance to make it. They all put everything they had into this movie and it payed off. This movie proves that it doesn't need a lot of money to make a successful movie.

Rocky has won several awards and is one of the winningest movies of all time. It has won an Academy Award for Best Picture, Academy Award for Best Director, Academy Award for Best Film Editing, David di Donatello for Best Foreign Actor, Directors Guild of America for Outstanding Directing, and a Japan Academy Prize for Outstanding Foreign Language Film (IMDB,2018). This movie won are was nominated for most of the awards in 1977. These awards back up the statement that Rocky is one of the greatest film ever created.

Many people view this as just another fighting movie and that this one is just falls in line behind other great boxing movies. This movie is another boxing movie but it is responsible for the birth of the four other Rockys and the new boxing movie creed.

In conclusion in a time when not many great emotional attaching movies were out Rocky was produced. The movie didn't need a ton of money and amazing CGI effects to make it great. The movie has a great storyline and some actors and producers that want a shot at making it big time. It won several awards and was one of the best movies of the decade. But Rocky remains one of the greatest movies of all time because of the amazing storyline and the emotional connection you feel towards the characters, the incredibly small budget they had to produce this movie and all of the awards that Rocky has won.