Early Access to ROCKY

One thing that I've noticed on rewatching it is that Paulie probably only set up Rocky and Adrian together when he thought that it would get him a job with Gazzo. Once he saw that wasn't happening, he turned on their relationship.

Such an iconic movie and intro! Glad you enjoyed it and really got the Rocky character and all of his and the movie's dynamics. I think Mick's main issue with Rocky throughout the film was that he worked as an enforcer thug and thought he was always mixed up with the wrong people, wasting his life and boxing talent. Still he should have said something (or had the movie showing that, right?), but maybe they really wanted to go for Mick being a pretty tough and unlikeable guy? That changes with the sequels though. There are some crazy "fun facts" throughout the entire franchise, but this one in particular has some really interesting ones. Sylvester Stallone actually had a little over $100 in the bank at the time he wrote the script (yes he wrote the movie), which he did in literally a few days - and still wouldn't sell it to the producers unless they actually casted him as the main character as well. In turn, they limited his salary for the movie to a little over $20,000 dollars and he used his own dog "Butkus" as the dog in the film. They had no catering or trailers on the set and used all natural lighting as they didn't even have the budget for those things etc. The meat punching scene - he hit it so hard, he really messed up his knuckles. The pre-fight scene where he points out they painted his shorts the wrong colors was just an actual costume design mistake they kept in the movie because they couldn't afford to correct it. They wanted to cast an actual boxer, Ken Norton, as Apollo Creed - but it didn't happen for whatever reason, and Carl Weathers, a little-known actor at the time in his own right, ultimately got the part, who apparently even insulted Stallone in some scenes for his own acting. Don't want to make this a novel (too late!) but there is a laundry list of interesting real-life things that happened in the movie, which Stallone always said was really just a love story with boxing. That's why he didn't care about the results of the fight and only Adrian - that and that he only wanted to go the distance with Creed. And what a result from taking a chance - it was ultimately nominated for 9 Academy Awards and won 3, including Best Picture and was a huge box office success. Talk about a real rags-to-riches story where art truly imitates life. Partly why it's such a beloved franchise and holds a special place with so many people, myself included obviously. 😬 Please keep going down the Rocky rabbit hole, you won't be disappointed!

Jason S.

Please check your messages; I helped you with another Letterboxd update (just add "The Batman" to the list). 🙂

Byrd N. Hand