Review of Rocky IV (1985) by David G — 30 Oct 2010

This film is nothing more than series of montages pandering to the MTV generation. And, for me, its the very reason why I fell in love with the cinema.

I was sitting mid-row and centre of what was an incredible phenomenon. There were 200 teenagers and adults alike cheering and yelling for the last 30 mins of the film which contain 2 heart-pounding training montages and by far the best fight of all the Rocky films. That was an experience I had never felt and and not since. Even now I can't watch the film without getting goosebumps thinking about it. I wonder if the other 199 viewers feel the same.

The film is not the best scripted and is very clunky in places, especially the 2 main scenes between Rocky and Adrian - and the less said about the speech at end the better.

But everything else in the film makes up for this. The cinematography is incredible. The direction very fast and punchy with what I still consider to be the best movie soundtrack and score of any film made. A huge round of applause to Vince DiCola for that.

Stallone looks like he had a lot of fun making this film and also put himself through hell if the montages and stories of hideous injuries are anything to go by.

Brigette Nielsen is great playing Ludmilla even with the terrible accent. Dolph Lundgren is perfect as the fighter named "Death from Above". Burt Young plays the exaggerated comedy sidekick, Paulie. Tony Burton is very under-used.

To me, this film is a perfect film experience. Not a perfect film by any means and I would score it 92/100.

Frank Capra (Director of "It's A Wonderful Life") was quoted as saying he wish he'd made Rocky (the original). If I could make one film I would want to make this one.

To summarise - fucking awesome.

Favourite Moment:

Rocky "I see 3 of them out there".

Paulie "Hit the one in the middle.".

Tony "Right, hit the one in the middle".