On R List of Movie Reviews

(For optimum viewing, adjust the zoom level of your browser to 125%.)


Rocky IV (1985)

Rate: 7
Viewed: 12/03, 12/05, 6/11, 9/20

Rocky4
12/05: Standing at a good half foot taller, Ivan Drago famously says to Rocky, "I must break you," and the rest is history for Dolph Lundgren.

Anyway, here we go again: more Rocky crap. I have the formula memorized, and it simply repeats here except for one twist: Apollo Creed is killed. Cuing Ivan to describe his death perfectly, "If he dies, he dies."

All in all, Sylvester Stallone went for broke in Rocky IV and therefore made good bank.

6/11: Okay, okay...Rocky IV isn't bad this time.

It's a good movie with a very memorable character in Ivan Drago. The funniest irony is he's painted as the bad guy for being on steroids yet Sylvester Stallone had taken copious amounts of them for so many years. Who's really the hypocrite here? The other is that no scenes of Rocky IV were filmed in Russia.

Although Apollo Creed is a great boxer, I hate his prematch introductions. It's no wonder why Apollo got killed because he wasted all his energy before the fight was about to commence. Had Apollo been more focused, he would've survived and probably win the match. Dolph Lundgren makes his character work, and he'll go on to be a famous star despite being an insanely terrible actor. The montage training scene is, once again, inspiring.

All in all, Rocky IV is much better than the previous sequel.

9/20: I prefer Rocky IV over the last sequel because it's a major improvement in many aspects.

The best part is Ivan Drago who's perfectly played by Dolph Lundgren in the role of his career. He'll never reach the same heights again. I love his character's scant supply of lines: "If he dies, he dies" and "I must break you." Of course, the victim to his soul-crushing punches is Apollo Creed who proved to be a great champion with the fatal tendency of displaying too much showmanship.

Character-wise, Sylvester Stallone is in better form than Rocky III. His training montage that's intercut with Dolph's is more exciting this time although the overall editing can be sometimes terrible.

Of course, the filmmakers want to make me think that USA is good and USSR is bad and that Rocky is clean and Ivan is dirty, but who are we kidding here? USA has always been bad and corrupt, and their athletes have been cheating for decades. There's absolutely no way Rocky has a shredded body as shown in the film without the help of anabolic steroids and diuretics. So...please, stop with the hypocrisy.

Ivan Drago's punch power is approximately 2,000 pounds per square inch (psi) when the average for boxers of his division is around 1,200 to 1,700 psi. I estimate Ivan must have hit Rocky in the head at least 100 times during the match. Hence, why didn't the latter show any symptoms of dementia pugilistica in parts six and seven?

All in all, thanks to Dolph Lundgren's effective performance as Ivan Drago, Rocky IV is a highly memorable boxing picture.