Rocky II

1979 sequel

Rating: 12/20

Plot: The world champion's pissed following the improbable conclusion to the last movie. People are questioning whether Creed really deserved the decision, and his ego can't take it. He pressures our titular hero into a rematch. Rocky's reluctant, and his manager and wife aren't happy with the idea. Family pressures and an inability to read become other obstacles that Rocky must overcome, and there's only one thing that can save him--a leather jacket with a tiger on it!

I'll argue that Rocky inexplicably seems more lucid the more he gets hit in the head, but that tiger jacket? Nobody in his right mind is going to see that thing and think it's a good idea. He also proposes to Adrian ("Yo, I was wondering if you wouldn't mind marrying me very much."), clumsily, at the zoo in front of a tiger who looks to be embarrassed that he has to be in the movie, and Gazzo's driver in the first movie told us that the zoo is where retards like to go. Remember: driver's words; not mine. Later, we get the classic "I never use condominiums" line, Rocky's admittance that he can't "tell time real good" [sic], and the reading "It makes me smeal mainly" from a cue card. And there's that Tarzan yell again, something that's got to be scripted. So the answer to another character's question "Do you think you had brain damage?" would still have to be a definitive yes, but his brain still seems stronger than it did in the first movie, a trend that will oddly continue through the first four of these movies.

This is very much a case of "second verse, same as the first." We start by showing the end of the first movie again, something that happens in all the rest of these Rocky movies and in The Karate Kid II. There are more Jesus allusions, and the biggest difference is that we get a more offensive, improbable Hollywood feel-good ending. Now, I'm not a boxing expert (there was a time when I did watch a lot of boxing though), and I've never even been in a fight, but I might know more about the sport than Stallone's character here. If somebody is punching me, I'd at least know to put my hands up and protect my face. The boxing match that ends this chapter in the story could only happen in a movie. But more offensive than that to my sensibilities is the whole Hollywoody Adrian coma nonsense even though we get to see a premature baby with more hair than Mickey and hear what might be the worst poem ever recited on film. Am I a bad person for laughing during that scene? I like that the Apollo Creed character has two sides here--the showman and the more classy other side. And initially, I thought Burgess Meredith's Mickey was going to save this thing. The more Mickey we got--"He'll hoit ya poymament!"; "A good snarl can give you what the Bible calls a psychological edge."--the better. Later, I changed my mind about that as Mickey turned into more of a parody. Still, Burgess Meredith is the best thing about this movie.

My idea for how this should have ended: At the 1:30 mark, while Rocky is running and being chased by about a thousand children, he's struck by a truck and dies instantly. That would have saved us all from a lot of nonsense.

One more thing: I'd like to live in a place where guys sing around burning trashcans.