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Lords of the ring

Sylvester Stallone as Rocky Balboa
  • Posted at 2:52pm
  • 25 January 2008
  • by AndrewCollins-RT

I don't want to get into a fight about it, but I'm no fan of boxing. I've no interest in watching two men beat the hell out of each other in front of a baying crowd. (Mind you, people watching fast cars going round and round a track baffles me just as much.) So explain this: why do I enjoy boxing movies so much?

Clearly, anyone with a passing interest in the grammar of cinema will appreciate the slow-motion grace of Martin Scorsese's boxing scenes in Raging Bull. And I think we all accept now that Rocky is a worthy inclusion in the 1970s "New Hollywood" canon. Grainy, gritty, mumbly, shot on location – it's actually Mean Streets with Oscars.

Rocky certainly doesn't sidestep the brutality of the ring (the scene with the swollen eyes and the razor blade is an image that will never leave me). The first five Rockys are showing this week on Sky Movies Modern Greats, and there's pounding entertainment in at least the first three.

I also appreciated Depression-era biopic Cinderella Man. The overcooked domestic scenes with Russell Crowe and Renée Zellweger were a bit naff, but the boxing bits were great. And I wasn't at all affronted when the 60-year-old Sylvester Stallone staged a comeback with last year's Rocky Balboa, as I can see, this far into the series, that boxing is merely a metaphor for one man's struggle towards self-actualisation.

At the end of the day, I can appreciate the sport for its visual power, its primal symbolism and its cultural importance – but still maintain the view that, in real life, it's unsavoury, regressive and demeaning. I don't condone organised crime, either, but some of my favourite films are full of it. Never did get into racing-car movies, though.

So why not tell us which is your favourite boxing movie? Or do you hate the sport? Post a comment below.

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