"It don't hurt having an angel in your corner, you know."

Rating: 7/10 (1 September 2012)

Personally, extending the Rocky franchise beyond the first three movies was probably asking for trouble, but that could just be me. "Rocky IV" struck me as a quick way to make a buck with a series of cobbled together scenes from the first three films with a resounding sound track pumping up the volume. This one has a bit more of a plot to it, with the strained relationship between Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) and his son (real life son Sage Stallone) at the center of the story. It works up to a point, but by the time it develops into an alley fight between The Rock and his protégé Tommy Gunn (Tommy Morrison), all semblance of believability just melts away in a flash of fists and fury.
For starters, you have to consider the length of time it would have taken Tommy to begin training with Rocky, develop into a preliminary fighter, and then compile a record of 22 and 0 to earn a championship match. Even if he fought every two months, it still would have taken a couple of years to get to the Union Cane fight. The way this story blazes by, it seems like it all takes place in a matter of days and Tommy suddenly finds himself at the top of the boxing world. And THEN, all of a sudden, Union Cane is outed as a fraud? That just made my head spin. No one becomes the World Champ by beating pushovers, what alternate universe would this have taken place in?
You know, the Rocky films played a nasty trick on me when they had his manager Mickey (Burgess Meredith) die in "Rocky II". For the longest time I couldn't figure out if Meredith was dead or alive when he showed up in the sequels. I know, it's easy enough to look up, but it's one of those things that keep you guessing. To save you the trouble, Meredith was alive when he made his daydream appearances in this film. For my money, the best sequence in the picture was the one where Rocky had the imaginary conversation with his former manager. That was very well done.
As I write this review, I'm stunned by the news that Sage Stallone passed away just a month ago. I never heard about it at the time, and as I read the links from the IMDb website, I'm reminded that life isn't like the movies where happy endings have a tendency to prevail. My condolences go out to Stallone and his family, and I hope the Rocky spirit gets him through this ordeal.