Rocky Balboa

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 04:30:48 +0000

I still remember my father dragging me to the cinema to catch all those "Rockies". He brought me to a few, didn't know which, but I remember seeing Rocky Jr. so it had to be the later ones. At home, he further fed me with "Rocky" protein-mix on tape.

My father is not a movie person. He has difficulties following plots even if it's a Jackie Chan. Till this date, the only thing he knows about Rocky Balboa is he's an underdog. Nevermind Rocky went bankrupt and everything, I doubt my father even knows Rocky has a son.

You see, my father is not much of a cinema person as well. Darkness invites sleep. And that's what he did. He didn't wake up until Rocky's theme started blasting through the cinema's loudspeaker from the front. It's time for Rocky's montage.

And that's exactly where all the Rocky tapes are wound. A Rocky session at home begins with the training montage followed immediately by the match finale. Any drama in between is butchered by the forward button.

Then later, I caught them again on TV and videos, at home, hotels, aboard a ship, on cable, et cetera. By then, I was just watching to kill time or fill in all the missing pieces and laugh at the way Rocky talks. I couldn't care less watching Rambo (at that point in time, Rambo's popularity had superceded Rocky's, with the cartoon series, action figures, and all) throw a punch.

But I care for "Rocky Balboa" (even if it's obviously part of Stallone's retirement fund). This whole Rocky and Stallone out-of-retirement thing has quite the pulling-effect on me--sort of a must-see--spurred by curiosity to see if Stallone's ego is big enough to ensure Rocky wins. Of course with the craze for alternate endings these days, he managed to do both.

The obligatory montage and Rocky theme remained in "Rocky Balboa", although thankfully (and tastefully) most of the horns, choir, and electronica twangs had been replaced with more contemporary orchestraic sounds. Still sound kinda dated to me though, I don't know, maybe it's just a nolstagic ringing. What is obviously missing in "Rocky Balboa" is the embarassing "Eye Of The Tiger", which I think's a good thing. The song had been spoofed so many times in comedies it would probably make Rocky looked like a wanker.

I didn't laugh at the Italian Stallion's speech this time around. I cringed. His monologues were too long and his co-stars just stood there with that dumbfounded awe-look on their face. I bet that Peter Petrelli guy--as Rocky Jr.--had difficulty in one of those scenes that he had to resort to his I-am-so-confuse-about-my-powers expression.

Speaking of Peter Petrelli, I think I saw Masi Osaka in the end-credits where he did one of his "Yatta!" outside the Philadelphia Museum of Art. It might have been taken from the previous "Rockies" though, so it might not had been him, not sure.

Like all Rocky fans in the end-credits, my father took a photo in front of the museum when he was in The States a few years back. Thanks to his uninteresting demeanour, he just stood there. I remember asking him about Rocky's statue when he showed us the photo.

"There was a statue?" he said.

Looking For Comedy In The Muslim World

Sun, 04 Mar 2007 13:30:28 +0000

I've never been much of a fan of Albert Brooks. Never did find him funny--stand-up or movies. Don't mean to be unkind here, but I think comedians need to have certain brand-style of humour, or certain looks at least. And he got none in either departments. The only thing got me going here is the word Muslim in the title.

"Looking For Comedy In The Muslim World" is written and directed by Albert Brooks. He plays himself, rejected by producers--they hated his latest movie, "In-Laws", and frankly, so did I--to host a show, commisioned by the president "whom we all know has too much sense of humour", sent to India and Pakistan with two aides in tow (the younger one doesn't even know who he is), find out what makes Muslim people laugh, all in the hope of winning the Medal of Honor, or Freedom whatever you know, "the pretty one".

Albert is seldom funny in the movie. Sometimes behaves like a whiny princess, and wears Aladdin shoes. His previous movies were forgetable. He is known to India as the guy who plays the cartoon fish. I know him as the comedian who finally got funny.

Albert's Albert doesn't have all the funny lines, the Indians and one Iranian does. "I was the funniest one in school. I was also the funniest one in explosive training," the Iranian said to his Indian girlfriend, Maya, Albert's "typist" in India (Writer's note: She's the most do-able Indian I've ever seen).

He kind of wrote the movie in a self-deprecating manner, to me at least, and it worked for the better. His co-stars provided the laughs, and he gets the credit as the writer and director. Either that or he realized he ain't so funny himself. Nah, all comedians think they are funny.

Plus, he's the one who wrote it.

my column

Rocky Balboa

Looking For Comedy In The Muslim World