Friday, February 02, 2007

Rocky Balboa


The DVD of Rocky Balboa is not my kind of film as I dislike boxing and violence, but there are some good scenes and script in the film. Junior saw it in Fiji recently and he told me to notice the good script. Instead of watching it all I just looked up stuff about the film on Google such as wikipedia.

I was interested in a scene between Rocky and his son.

Robert (Milo Ventimiglia). Robert is the opposite of Rocky - a buttoned-down, corporate-minded businessman who is trying to carve out his own place in a very different world. Rocky's relationship with Robert is tumultuous because Robert has always had to live under the shadow of his famed father; he even believes that the only reason he was hired for his latest job was because of his last name, Balboa. But it is through the course of the movie that we see the relationship mend itself through Rocky's admonishment to his son that his life is his own and he must be willing to take the chances necessary for an opportunity to succeed.
Rocky’s speech to his son

Here's an example of the script:

Somewhere along the line you changed. You stopped being you. You let people stick a finger in your face and tell you you’re no good and things got hard, you started looking for things to blame. Like a big shadow.

Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s very mean and nasty place. And I don’t care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me or nobody is going to hit as hard as life.

But it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep amoving forwards, how much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done.

Now if you know what you’re worth, you gotta be out there willing to take the hits and not point fingers ‘cos of him or her or anybody if you aint’ where you wanna be. Cowards do that. That ain’t you. You’re better than that.

7 comments:

laminar_flow said...

Wendy,

The dialogue of industry standard screenplays require a character's name and indented away from the margins.

I'm currently rewriting one, set in Fiji.

Remember, less is more.

Peceli and Wendy's Blog said...

Laminar, yep I know that but my son only wanted me to write out the speech of Rocky. His son doesn't speak at all.
Good luck with your play. A very good idea. Another Larry Thomas?
w.

laminar_flow said...

Larry has his own path and I, my own.

Note theater plays use an entirely different script and style compared to film scripts. The latter craft, which I am an apprentice to.

Peceli and Wendy's Blog said...

So it's a film script you are writing? I haven't seen many films about Islanders though there was one about Rotuma which I haven't seen. Two interesting films from New Zealand though are 'Seone's Wedding' and 'No 2', the latter about a Fijian grandmother in Auckland.
Good luck and tell us more later on about your script.
Writing for plays or film can tell a lot of truth as you get inside the head of each character. Probably better than political talk perhaps?
w.

Pandabonium said...

Interesting. I don't like watching people beat each other's brains out either, but can appreciate a good message. (I've only seen part of one "Rocky" movie.)

From what I read about Stallone making this moving the words sound like they are coming from his personal thoughts about how he let the movie industry use him in the past, but would not for this film.

Anonymous said...

I saw this movie last night. I heard the Rocky talking to his son. We have four children. Their father my husband has worked hard all his life. He has dignity,pride and love for them. They blame him for all their set backs. These are amazing words I am so please I found them and now they are going to be framed in my home. No more we are a family and love hold us together stuff.
thank you
A mother who worked hard and children left her.

Peceli and Wendy's Blog said...

Though I don't like boxing at all, I do think this speech is very good and that's why I copied it down.
w.