Solid Entertainment

Rating: 8/10 (22 December 2015)

Continuing my plan to watch every Sly Stallone movie in order, I come to the sequel to his most famous role Rocky 2.
Stallone once again wrote the script, but this time he is directing the movie, along with playing the lead role too. Following the theory that success is not to be tampered with, Stallone reassembles all the cast from the Oscar winning movie 'Rocky' and puts them in a movie very similar to the first.
Plot In A Paragraph: Straight after his Championship bout with Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) Rocky Balboa (Stallone) retires from boxing. Following a brief high, Rocky struggles in family life, while the embarrassed champ goads him to accept a challenge for a rematch.
Stallones second attempt at directing (the under rated Paradise Alley being the first) is an enjoyable movie, but it drags on places and pales in comparison to the first movie (which it borrows so heavily from) and is more than a tad predictable.
Stallone is never more at home, than when he is playing Rocky, and he does a great job again here. First as we watch Rocky nervously propose, then as he briefly enjoys the high life, before we see him embarrassed and humiliated on numerous occasions. We feel his joy, and we feel his pain. That is the beauty of when Stallone plays Rocky. A trait he seems unable to translate in to other roles. Both F.I.S.T and Paradise Alley feature good performances from Stallone, but audiences stayed away in droves.
All the supporting cast are great again Talia Shire, Carl Weathers and Burgess Meridith all get individual scenes to shine. The brilliant Burt Young is a little under used though, as is Joe Spinell as Gazzo
The boxing scenes are well choreographed, and once again, Bill Conti's score hits all the right notes.
A solid 8/10 for this reviewer.