Nothing...absolutely nothing else in the world...gets my blood pumping like Rocky IV. Somehow that movie captured the entire range of human emotion while singlehandedly winning the cold war against the USSR. Every time Rocky Balboa landed a body blow on Captain Ivan Drago...somehow...somewhere...a brick fell from the Berlin wall. After grossing $127.8 million in the United States and $175 million outside of the US (thank YOU NATO countries) it is no wonder the Berlin Wall came down. The timeliness is just too convenient. The movie released on November 27th 1985 and by November 9th 1989, (after dominating the theaters and following that with an amazing VHS release)...obviously, the wall was structurally unsound. All of the the scenes that you may have seen on TV of the wall being torn down were probably staged by the US government to hide the true power of the Rocky Franchise and Hollywood. Reagan (being an actor, he understood the power of American movies) even staged his famous speech where he challenged Mikhail Gorbachev to "tear down this wall". Now I love Reagan as much as any other American, but lets be honest...it was easy for Reagan to make such bold claims considering the damage the Italian Stallion had caused.
Sadly the history books won't properly document how the cold war was really won (though, the Versus channel does its best to show Rocky I - IV at least once a week) and America will continue to believe that we won the war through diplomatic, military, and economic pressure on the Soviet Union...luckily some of us still remember what Stallone did for this country (not to mention his contributions as Rambo rescuing POWs in Vietnam). I leave you with a picture of Rocky draped in an American flag and the chorus to Hearts on Fire (the song that plays during the classic Rocky workout and mountain climbing montage).
hearts on fire
strong desire
rages deep within
hearts on fire
fever's rising high
the moment of truth draws near
Note: This post is what happens when I start homework at 1 AM (having successfully put it off all day) that I don't want to do...I should be writing an Executive Summary for my Applications of Technology class and instead I'm blogging until 2 AM...which means I'll be up doing homework until 3 AM.
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