Sylvester Stallone: Life Imitates Art
After doing the Schwarzenegger article, a few people mentioned their love of Sylvester Stallone movies. I understood. Stallone made a few really great movies, but he couldn't hold a candle to Arnie. When Arnold was making hit after hit, Stallone was warning people to "Stop! or My Mom Will Shoot." If Arnie is the King of Action Movies, Sly is the King of Flops. For crying out loud, in Over the Top he arm wrestles a dude to win a truck...to win his kid's heart! In fact, I was so not interested in doing this comparison because I felt there was no merit to it, I shelved the idea. That all changed when AMC was showing Demolition Man the other night and I was reminded of Stallone's star power.
you know a movie is legit when it gets friggin' pinball machine artwork!
**Mike Lunsford you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute**
what? I can't say friggin?
**Mike Lunsford you are fined one credit for....**
Say what you will about Demolition Man (the movie, not the song by the Police), but it's a fun action ride and it still holds up to this day. So what's the deal then? How can someone who's made some of the most awful piles of crap in movie history keep coming back for more? He, just like his most famous character Rocky, doesn't ever give up. Stallone was able to resurrect his own career in 2006 with a better swan song for Rocky and brought himself back into the limelight based solely on his ability as a writer and his incredible work ethic. Damn...he IS Rocky! His life imitates his art....whoa. And I said the title of the article IN the article. There's gotta be points for that, right?
It wouldn't be GGR if we didn't have a list of some sort. Let's talk about Stallone's improbable comeback and how his two biggest characters helped him do it.
Rocky Franchise
When we compare Arnie and Sly, Arnie comes out on top as far as his consistency. There are some bad Schwarzenegger movies, but not nearly as many as Stallone. Where Stallone trounces Schwarzenegger though is his ability to write incredible stories. Rocky was Stallone's baby. He wrote it himself, he starred in the movie and was instrumental in making it the way we all know it today (can you imagine if he had let the producers go with who they wanted to star in the movie; Robert Redford or Burt Reynolds? Totally different film). This movie put him on the map.
Rocky inspired a generation. It was the ultimate underdog story. It was praised across the board and nominated for 10 Academy Awards, actually winning best director and best picture in 1976. The movie was such a hit, the city of Philadelphia kept the prop statue used in the movies and put it outside their art museum.
not pictured: A-holes standing next to the statue pretending to punch Rocky in the bean bag.
The movie ended up spawning 6 sequels. Rocky II & III were both box office winners and critically acclaimed, Rocky IV won at the box office but not as far as the reviewers were concerned and Rocky V...well...there's a reason it took Stallone nearly 16 years to come back to tell more of the Italian Stallion's story.
In 2006, Stallone penned, starred and directed Rocky Balboa. Many movie-goers and reviewers assumed this was just a cash-grab. They were blown away with the quality of the final product. You could see a lot of Stallone's own heart poured into this movie as the aging, arthritic former champion has been reduced to living off of the stories of his glory days and running a restaurant named after his now deceased wife. He gets a chance to fight one last time in an exhibition match against the current champion and in the process, rebuilds a broken relationship with his son. The boxing scenes were lauded as some of the most realistic of any boxing movie. Stallone's writing was applauded as well, along with his acting and directing.
The movie was so successful, it spawned another sequel. Creed, which came out November of 2015 focuses on the illegitimate son of Rocky's former rival/friend Apollo Creed who wants to learn how to box and travels to Philly to find Rocky. I haven't seen it yet (but our buddies over at ComicsOnline have and did a review. Check it out!), but I have heard nothing but incredible things about it. It holds a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes as of writing this, and that's definitely impressive. To take a film series that was "on the ropes" and resurrect it to make 2 successful sequels when everyone counted the Rocky franchise for dead is incredible; a true testament to Stallone's writing and acting ability.
Rambo Franchise
In 1982, Stallone, already a star from the first 3 Rocky movies, took on the role of John Rambo in the movie First Blood. He plays a troubled Vietnam veteran who must rely on his combat and survival skills against the abusive law enforcement of a small town. Things take a turn in the story as you realize that the police are the ones who should be worried for their lives. The ex-Special Forces soldier is in his element in the forests of the Pacific Northwest. The hunter becomes the hunted, so to speak.
Stallone kills it in this movie (no pun intended). His performance is incredible, especially when his former SF commander tries to bring him in and Rambo breaks down. At a time when many veterans felt betrayed by their country after serving with honor, this movie was a sounding board for them. All of them had wanted to say the same things John Rambo was screaming at his C.O. With scenes like those, it's not easy to be believable with such intense emotion, but Stallone masterfully pulls it off.
Like his Rocky franchise, the Rambo movies continued forward with a series of sequels. However, with the Rambo franchise, none of the subsequent films had the same impact as First Blood. Action film fans loved them, but their messages rang hollow where the original film had such a powerful message. The third installment, with a very noticeable anti-Soviet sentiment, was received as a bit tone deaf, as at the time of release, Gorbachev was "lowering" the Iron Curtain and attemptinrg to build a relationship with the West. The Berlin Wall came down only a year later. It seemed that with the Soviets no longer our biggest enemy, Rambo III would be the end of the series. In fact, there were attempts at doing another film in 1997 when Miramax bought the rights to the Rambo franchise. Stallone stated he was "no longer doing action movies."
yeah...we believe that one Sly.
You would think that attempting the same formula with the character of John Rambo that worked so well for Rocky Balboa would be a horrible idea. The fact of the matter is that Rambo reminded us that Stallone makes a damn good action hero. Rambo is brutal, bloody, violent, yet captivating throughout the course of the film. And just think about this for a moment: had there been no forth installment of Rambo, we may not have gotten the amazing, over-the-top cheesy-ness that is The Expendables series.
The Expendables: resurrecting action heroes since 2010!
When looking over Stallone's career, it is one of huge hits, and huge misses. We won't dwell on those horrific films...but we will list off some of them
1. Judge Dredd - First off, he takes his helmet off early in the movie and never puts it back on. Huge no-no as far as the character goes...not to mention Rob Schneider sucked so hard in this movie.
2. Lock Up - a lot of people don't even remember this movie. They're lucky. Even Donald Sutherland sucked in this movie, and he's a really good actor!
3. Cobra - Come on, Sly. This was originally supposed to be Beverly Hills Cop. You and Eddie Murphy would have been a better fit. Instead you mumble and have a matchstick in your mouth. Thank god Brigette Nielsen was in the movie...oh wait...no she sucked, too. But wasn't that the reason you put her in this movie? (HI-YO!!)
4. Rhinestone - You...and Dolly Parton...and she bets she can make you a country music star or she has to sleep with her manager...are you f***ing serious?
5. Stop or My Mom Will Shoot - This movie is horrible. It makes no damn sense. It almost single-handedly derailed your career Mr. Stallone.
In spite of all of those horrible movies (and there are more...good God are there more), you managed to make amazing films after them! Just like your character, Rocky you take some horrible shots that would have destroyed other men...yet you found a way to dust yourself off and came back even stronger.
