THE PITCH
WORTH
$$$$$
THE VIEWING
"What was his name?"
Honestly, I didn’t expect much from a spin off in a series now 7 deep. I went in hoping that the new director and screenwriter Ryan Coogler didn’t muck it up that bad… my expectations were grossly surpassed. I almost want to delay writing about it until I had some time away from the moment. Just so you don’t get a false review based on a decent movie not being a terrible one, allow me to add that I saw it again yesterday and KNOWING what was going to happen it STILL enthralled and captured me… I’ll explain.
The first thing I noticed was the very seamless and uncomplicated character build up with ALL the characters. Secondly the subplots were just as important as the main plot to me. I loved the meet cute with his love interest. The dialog boxes popping up when a new opponent was introduced to streamline the energy flow of those already tense moments. I thought [from the trailer] that this would be a straight line from Apollo’s son learning that his father is Apollo Creed, then him seeking Rocky for help and they go on to the big fight… the path took so many detours that the longest ‘Rocky” film according to imdb.com didn’t seem long at all.
During production, he fought real fighters and had no body double. “That was him taking real punches,” Mr. Coogler said. “That was all Mike.” Mr. Jordan was routinely bloodied, bruised and dizzy — “pain,” he said, “was definitely involved” — and endured ice baths and a Chinese therapy called Gua sha. (Google image it if you dare.) Beyond the physical duress, he also had to meet the emotional demands of his role: falling in love, channeling anger and wrestling childhood demons.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/movies/michael-b-jordan-gives-millennials-their-rocky-with-creed.html
"What was his name?"
This film was kind of important to me. Like most Americans growing up in the 80’s I saw and loved every Rocky film. Selective memory of my childhood allows me to remember little things like my first time in the theater watching The Empire Strikes Back and how I felt about Han Solo being frozen like that… no horror movie ever came CLOSE to that feeling. I also remember walking out of Superman (Christopher Reeves) at age 3, beating everyone to the car to see if I could lift it... dead set on picking it off the ground. I also remember being in the theater with my sister(s) watching Rocky 2 in 1979 [I was four] and all of us up and out of our seats bouncing and throwing straights, hooks and haymakers at the screen alongside Rock to get that title… That, whole [entire] feeling, was recaptured in this flawlessly done masterpiece.
Honestly, I didn’t expect much from a spin off in a series now 7 deep. I went in hoping that the new director and screenwriter Ryan Coogler didn’t muck it up that bad… my expectations were grossly surpassed. I almost want to delay writing about it until I had some time away from the moment. Just so you don’t get a false review based on a decent movie not being a terrible one, allow me to add that I saw it again yesterday and KNOWING what was going to happen it STILL enthralled and captured me… I’ll explain.
The first thing I noticed was the very seamless and uncomplicated character build up with ALL the characters. Secondly the subplots were just as important as the main plot to me. I loved the meet cute with his love interest. The dialog boxes popping up when a new opponent was introduced to streamline the energy flow of those already tense moments. I thought [from the trailer] that this would be a straight line from Apollo’s son learning that his father is Apollo Creed, then him seeking Rocky for help and they go on to the big fight… the path took so many detours that the longest ‘Rocky” film according to imdb.com didn’t seem long at all.
Thirdly, well, let me say it like this… usually when a cinematic franchise decides to go modern-urban they either miss the mark too high whereas it is corny or too low and the general public doesn’t feel the authenticity, common term is “too street”. Sylvester and Ryan Coogler [dir. of Fruitvale Station] did something very unique and special. They seamlessly combined the very best of both worlds and presented it very neatly, ultimately the quintessential boxing movie that was thoroughly more than the genre itself.
Fourthly, the action set a new precedent for captured movement in films. I don’t know if Michael B. Jordan was really taking shots or if CGI was involved. That fact that I don’t know is just as amazing to me. The freelance camera angles in the ring and super close-ups made each swing, connected or not, seem personal. In fact that zoom lens was used throughout the film in non-action shots too. There was an “artsy” feel to the story using the camera that way only this film wasn’t boring. Shots fired. Cue in Nas’s “Made you look”, and speaking of Nas…
Lastly, I MUST own this soundtrack and while I am at it I will purchase the score movie music as well. Not going to go down the film track for track but EVERYTHING just worked. I am especially impressed with Tessa Thompson’s 3 tracks. I have a love for Electronic music.
Definitely Worth Watching and worth owning. Don’t wait for bluray though, go be apart of the electricity in the theater. Almost every experience in the theater that I’ve heard of, including my two, was a lot of crowd participation and applauding… not just at the end but throughout. As a film lover it was pretty cool seeing my family and myself enjoying ROCKY again, even if I was watching us through the little kids a few rows in front covering up or yelling “Get Uuuuup!!!”
Smh, marvelous.
letter grade: A+
from the NyTimes:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/movies/michael-b-jordan-gives-millennials-their-rocky-with-creed.html
