This week on Fabulous Film and Friends we’re giving it the “ole one-two” with a match- up between 1976’s classic, Oscar winning underdog boxer sensation Rocky directed by John G. Avildsen and starring Sylvester Stallone, Talia Shire, Burt Young, Carl Weathers and Burgess Meredith and its 2015 spin-off reboot, Creed, directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad, Tony Bellew and Graham McTavish.
Joining me today are Alex Robertson, no stranger to pugilism he, and my sister Roseanne. Don’t be fooled by her English lit degree and fancy pants talk, she’s a sucker for an old fashioned, meat and potatoes, rag-tag-group-of- misfits come-from-behind, sports epic.
Before the round one bell, the synopses:
Rocky tells the story of Rocky Balboa, an amiable but down-on-his-luck and seemingly dim-witted Philadelphia club fighter who gets the chance of a lifetime when the World Heavyweight Champion, Apollo Creed, picks his name out of a hat and gives him shot at the Heavyweight Title. Overcoming self-doubt with the help of his crusty trainer Mickey and his pathologically shy girlfriend Adrian, as well as his best friend Paulie, Rocky rises to the challenge and goes the distance with Creed giving him the fight of his life when all he was expected to do was show up and get knocked out.
Nearly 40 years and five sequels later, Creed picks up the narrative in 1998 with 13-year old Adonis Johnson, Apollo Creed’s illegitimate son, who is rescued from a life of group homes and juvenile detention centers by Apollo’s widow Mary Anne. Flash forward 17 years after living a life of upper-class respectability, Adonis has a promising job with a top financial firm but gives it up for his true passion: boxing. Moving to Philadelphia to seek out Rocky Balboa, his father’s once arch rival and then protegee, too train him, Adonis meets a beautiful club musician named Bianca in his new apartment building. Succeeding in convincing Rocky Balboa be his trainer and manager, and with his father’s natural boxing ability to aid him, Adonis handily wins his first major fight. At that point he is picked to fight Pretty Ricky Conlan, the Heavyweight Champion of the world after the word gets out that Adonis is Apollo Creed’s son. The only catch: He must use his father’s last name and drop “Johnson,” his mother’s last name. With Bianca’s guidance, Adonis concludes that he must take his father’s name and embrace his father’s legacy with all the pressure that comes with it.
Who wins by a knockout? Find out!