To recapitulate from 10-05:
Just so you know, Rocky V never happened. It just didn’t, you hear me? It. Didn’t. Happen. I think Rocky IV happened, but I’m not sure. Maybe Apollo is dead, maybe he ain’t. But we KNOW that Rocky, under Apollo’s guidance, defeated Clubber Lang in his last fight as the heavyweight champ. That happened.
Rocky III is, without question, my favorite of the series. Rocky is an excellent film, and it’s enjoyable as a movie too, but III hits that perfect range where it reaches its comic book potential without jumping the shark. Almost.
There are a couple things that irritate me, like the issue of 10 title defenses in 3 years. So dude was fightin three times a year for the heavyweight belt? That, above everything else in this movie, is beyond my ability to suspend disbelief. The fact that Rocky’s knockin cats around the ring like a pinball machine? That’s stretchin it, but since we later find out that they’re hand-picked, I can live with it. But ten defenses? Nobody fights that much unless they’re dead broke. Then there’s that hug that Rocky and Apollo share that’s gotta be top 3 in the all-time awkard film moments. My last pet peeve is that at the Rocky shouldn’t be all cut until after Apollo gets done training him.
Those little niggling things aside, there are a couple things I really like about III. The first is Apollo’s smarts. When he joked in Rocky that he should’ve retired and run for Emperor, he probably could’ve done it. As typified in III, what was there that he couldn’t do? He had already put himself at the top of the moneymaking pyramid in II by promoting the fight himself. That makes him Ali + (Don King – lack of scruples). THen in III, he ads a little Angelo Dundee to the mix by training Rocky for the fight. His only tragic flaw was that he was terminally hardheaded. (The right woman woulda fixed that up, though.)_ But the bottom line is that in III, as in all of the Rocky movies that count, Apollo was the smartest person on the screen.
The other thing I loved about III was the notorious Clubber Lang. Mr. T. ain’t no thespian and nobody in their right mind should confuse him for one. The simple fact of the matter is, however, that he took the two-dimensional character, Clubber Lang, and made him breathe. I think a more accomplished actor may have been too busy trying to give the character depth to properly bring him alive. Rocky III is a comic book on film. A comic book is only as good as its villain, and Mr. T. as Clubber Lang was perfect.
If you think about it, there are certain traits that a comic book villain is supposed to have. Clubber had all of ‘em. In spades. Mean. Tough. Strong. Ruthless. Indomitable. Almost. There has to be that one flaw the hero can exploit, but until that flaw is revealed, the hero’s quest must seem impossible. In this case, Clubber’s internal flaw was the same one that Rocky had to overcome. How bad was Clubber? Let’s review:
- Knocked the dude down, pushed the ref out the way, then clocked dude again til he laid down flat.
- Hit the one dude so hard he curled into a fetal position on the canvas and started suckin his thumb.
- Pushed BOTH Rocky’s managers.
And then there was the ultimate – he tried to holler at Adrian on the steps of the Art Museum. With everybody watching.
For real though, who would’ve expected that? I’m sorry, that was pure genius. Not just that he said something to her, but that he addressed her as “woman.” You talkin about gully, it don’t GIT no gullier than this:
Hey woman! Hey woman!! Listen here. Since your ole man ain’t got no hawwwt, maybe you’d like to see a real man. I bet you stay up late every night, wishin you had a real man, don’t you?. I’ll tell you what – bring your pretty li’l self over to my apartment tonight, and I’ll show you a real man.
Now that’s classic. Classical, even. At some points, I have even been known to walk up on some female I know talmbout, “Hey woman!!”
And that’s before we even get to the Clubber Lang one-liners!
“No I don’t hate Balboa, but I pity the fool!”
“Don’t give ‘im no statue, give ‘im guts!!”
“Wha’chu say Paper Champion?! I’ma beat’chu like a dog!! A dog, you hear?!”
“You want some more? I got a lotta more for you if you get up! A lotta more!”
“I reject the challenge because Balboa is no challenge, but I’ll be more than happy to beat up on him some more.”
“I’m gonna torture him. I’m gonna crucify him. Real bad.”
“Hey fool! You ready for another beatin’? You should’a NEVA came back!!”
And the best/worst one of all, Clubber calls Rocky “nigga.” Think I’m lyin’, put your copy in and get to 47:29, after Clubber has knocked Rocky down. You tell me what you think he says.
Of course, any discussion of a Rocky movie would be incomplete without looking at the racial elements. Most people with my background/transcript highlight the fact that Clubber Lang is a near-textbook example of one of the traditional stereotypes of Black men. There’s no getting around that. But I think there’s something that has to be acknowledged. Apollo.
Yeah, we know that Apollo was a thinly-veiled imitation of Ali. But like I said up top, Apollo is also the smartest character in this picture. And yeah, it’s possible to read Apollo training Rocky as the usual “John the Baptist” move, but I think there’s another way to look at it.
Apollo, the brain, uses Rocky, the body, to achieve his ends. He gets into contact with Rocky because he’s bored. He’s not particularly interested in fighting anymore himself, but he likes being around it, so he co-opts the one person to defeat him as a professional. This, then, becomes a win-win situation for Apollo. He gets to train and be in the gym around the fellas, but he doesn’t hafta take any punches. Then, there’s the financial aspect. As Rocky’s manager, Apollo gets a cut of Rocky’s money. As the fight promoter, Apollo gets a cut of the overall gate, and probably a cut from each fighter. He’s covered whether Rocky wins or loses. Obviously for hs own pride, he wants Rocky to win, but whether Rocky wins or loses, Apollo wins. And I think the character would have been aware of exactly that. So any critique on a racial basis should at least hafta account for this stuff.
But that’s readin a little too deep. Like I said, III ain’t no film. It’s a movie. And it’s onea my favorites.
