Hands of Stone… Boxing Legend Roberto Duran

[GotNextTV]

Hands of Stone hit theaters on Friday, August 26, 2016. A greatly
anticipated film. Especially, for those who eat, breathe, and cry
boxing. Who's going to check it out?

http://gotnexttv.com/hands-of-stone-box ... rto-duran/

[Jacopodb]

The thing with biopics, is that they can easily turn into hagiographies... too easily: Alí, Bohemian Rhapsody, Someone Up There Likes Me, all smell like corny, cheesy melodrama, quite blackmailing, too (morally): "If you don't like this, you're not a legitimate fan/lover/evaluator"... that's the kind of statements they make, and it's sneaky-enough to me.

The only biopic I liked is Raging Bull, which is also the only boxing-movie I liked... Million Dollar Baby came close, but it's just too sad...

As much as I love boxing, I hate the whole Rocky saga... every once in a while, someone comes out with the usual monferrina: the "real Rocky" (real person which the character of Rocky would be based on), is: Gerry Cooney, Rocky Marciano, Vinny Pazienza, motherfuckin' Joe Bugner... "the real Rocky: Charlie Zelenoff!": we just miss this.

Forget about it...

[Onetimeonly]

Raging bull is insanely overrated

[man]

Raging bull is insanely overrated

no. it isn't.

[Jacopodb]

Raging bull is insanely overrated

I loved that movie, no matter what. I don't care wether it's considered a masterpiece or not, as long as I liked it.

Scorsese has done a more defining movie in Taxi Driver, and Goodfellas made him definitely a cultural icon, but I still consider Raging Bull one of the highest peaks in Scorsese's career.

Now what's really overrated is Rocky... talk about this: watching that movie is like tasting a slice of bread spread with butter, marmalade and sugar, drowned in honey.
It draws the stereotyped concepts of: boxing, Italians, and cheap philosophy, all in one movie.

[Ilya Muromets]

The thing with biopics, is that they can easily turn into hagiographies... too easily: Alí, Bohemian Rhapsody, Someone Up There Likes Me, all smell like corny, cheesy melodrama, quite blackmailing, too (morally): "If you don't like this, you're not a legitimate fan/lover/evaluator"... that's the kind of statements they make, and it's sneaky-enough to me.

The only biopic I liked is Raging Bull, which is also the only boxing-movie I liked... Million Dollar Baby came close, but it's just too sad...

As much as I love boxing, I hate the whole Rocky saga... every once in a while, someone comes out with the usual monferrina: the "real Rocky" (real person which the character of Rocky would be based on), is: Gerry Cooney, Rocky Marciano, Vinny Pazienza, motherfuckin' Joe Bugner... "the real Rocky: Charlie Zelenoff!": we just miss this.

Forget about it...

Have you seen "Fat City"? It's the opposite of those corny, cheesy boxing movies. It's my favorite boxing flick. It is the quintessential maudlin boxing movie though!

I ran into Duran on 47th St. in Manhattan once.

Charlie Z. I haven't heard about him lately. Is he still doing his thing, undefeated, 7,000-0?

[Jacopodb]

The thing with biopics, is that they can easily turn into hagiographies... too easily: Alí, Bohemian Rhapsody, Someone Up There Likes Me, all smell like corny, cheesy melodrama, quite blackmailing, too (morally): "If you don't like this, you're not a legitimate fan/lover/evaluator"... that's the kind of statements they make, and it's sneaky-enough to me.

The only biopic I liked is Raging Bull, which is also the only boxing-movie I liked... Million Dollar Baby came close, but it's just too sad...

As much as I love boxing, I hate the whole Rocky saga... every once in a while, someone comes out with the usual monferrina: the "real Rocky" (real person which the character of Rocky would be based on), is: Gerry Cooney, Rocky Marciano, Vinny Pazienza, motherfuckin' Joe Bugner... "the real Rocky: Charlie Zelenoff!": we just miss this.

Forget about it...

Have you seen "Fat City"? It's the opposite of those corny, cheesy boxing movies. It's my favorite boxing flick. It is the quintessential maudlin boxing movie though!

I ran into Duran on 47th St. in Manhattan once.

Charlie Z. I haven't heard about him lately. Is he still doing his thing, undefeated, 7,000-0?

The thing with Charlie Z is: he's clearly a psychotic, but even if he meets a doctor and recovers, he will forever be remembered for his antics, by millions of people around the world...

I had heard of that Fat City... so I rented the home-video, but that was, by opposite means, the equivalent of Rocky: as much as Rocky's corny and cheesy, Fat City was gratuitously bitter and decadent... I only liked Raging Bull as a boxing movie, for some reason.
Probably I'm just not an estimator of boxing-movies...

Thanks for the suggestion anyway.

[Ilya Muromets]

The thing with biopics, is that they can easily turn into hagiographies... too easily: Alí, Bohemian Rhapsody, Someone Up There Likes Me, all smell like corny, cheesy melodrama, quite blackmailing, too (morally): "If you don't like this, you're not a legitimate fan/lover/evaluator"... that's the kind of statements they make, and it's sneaky-enough to me.

The only biopic I liked is Raging Bull, which is also the only boxing-movie I liked... Million Dollar Baby came close, but it's just too sad...

As much as I love boxing, I hate the whole Rocky saga... every once in a while, someone comes out with the usual monferrina: the "real Rocky" (real person which the character of Rocky would be based on), is: Gerry Cooney, Rocky Marciano, Vinny Pazienza, motherfuckin' Joe Bugner... "the real Rocky: Charlie Zelenoff!": we just miss this.

Forget about it...

Have you seen "Fat City"? It's the opposite of those corny, cheesy boxing movies. It's my favorite boxing flick. It is the quintessential maudlin boxing movie though!

I ran into Duran on 47th St. in Manhattan once.

Charlie Z. I haven't heard about him lately. Is he still doing his thing, undefeated, 7,000-0?

The thing with Charlie Z is: he's clearly a psychotic, but even if he meets a doctor and recovers, he will forever be remembered for his antics, by millions of people around the world...

I had heard of that Fat City... so I rented the home-video, but that was, by opposite means, the equivalent of Rocky: as much as Rocky's corny and cheesy, Fat City was gratuitously bitter and decadent... I only liked Raging Bull as a boxing movie, for some reason.
Probably I'm just not an estimator of boxing-movies...

Thanks for the suggestion anyway.

Charley psychotic?

I don't think i ever saw Raging Bull. Well, Fat City is about the underbelly of boxing. Like so many other very good movies the music makes it memorable.

[Jacopodb]

Have you seen "Fat City"? It's the opposite of those corny, cheesy boxing movies. It's my favorite boxing flick. It is the quintessential maudlin boxing movie though!

I ran into Duran on 47th St. in Manhattan once.

Charlie Z. I haven't heard about him lately. Is he still doing his thing, undefeated, 7,000-0?

The thing with Charlie Z is: he's clearly a psychotic, but even if he meets a doctor and recovers, he will forever be remembered for his antics, by millions of people around the world...

I had heard of that Fat City... so I rented the home-video, but that was, by opposite means, the equivalent of Rocky: as much as Rocky's corny and cheesy, Fat City was gratuitously bitter and decadent... I only liked Raging Bull as a boxing movie, for some reason.
Probably I'm just not an estimator of boxing-movies...

Thanks for the suggestion anyway.

Charley psychotic?

I don't think i ever saw Raging Bull. Well, Fat City is about the underbelly of boxing. Like so many other very good movies the music makes it memorable.

That's suggestive-enough, but I like more romantic stuff, while Fat City is already decadent (or the equivalent of it): I like it not corny, not bitter, just a little romantic or picaresque: Once Upon A Time In America, Barry Lyndon,
Goodfellas... none of them is a boxing-movie, but Raging Bull is in that fashion: doesn't show any more than it has to show... violent, but not delving on violence, doesn't judge the characters, but doesn't even put them on a high horse, despite being protagonists, specially when they act like true motherf*ckers...

[Jacopodb]

Charley psychotic?

Nah, he just playing around... it's all staged, by the way.

[Ilya Muromets]

Charley psychotic?

Nah, he just playing around... it's all staged, by the way.

No unsuspecting casual gym visitors were harmed in the making of those movies. All were played by stunt actors.

[Jacopodb]

Charley psychotic?

Nah, he just playing around... it's all staged, by the way.

No unsuspecting casual gym visitors were harmed in the making of those movies. All were played by stunt actors.

Any resemblance to actual persons (specially Floyd Mayweather Sr....), living or dead, is merely coincidental.

[Jacopodb]

Charley psychotic?

Nah, he just playing around... it's all staged, by the way.

No unsuspecting casual gym visitors were harmed in the making of those movies. All were played by stunt actors.

Oh... don't try this at home, kids.

[Ilya Muromets]

Nah, he just playing around... it's all staged, by the way.

No unsuspecting casual gym visitors were harmed in the making of those movies. All were played by stunt actors.

Oh... don't try this at home, kids.

...without parental supervision.

PS. Even the soft plastic punching bag dummy in the basement of Charley's parents' house wasn't hurt during the making of the Charley Z. films, kids. It was a stunt dummy.

[Ilya Muromets]

Nah, he just playing around... it's all staged, by the way.

No unsuspecting casual gym visitors were harmed in the making of those movies. All were played by stunt actors.

Any resemblance to actual persons (specially Floyd Mayweather Sr....), living or dead, is merely coincidental.

F. Mayweather Sr. was played by Elliot Seymour, the homeless street guy who got KOd by delapidated 60 year old Hollywood actor Mickey Rourke in his triumphant return to the boxing ring.

[Jacopodb]

No unsuspecting casual gym visitors were harmed in the making of those movies. All were played by stunt actors.

Any resemblance to actual persons (specially Floyd Mayweather Sr....), living or dead, is merely coincidental.

F. Mayweather Sr. was played by Elliot Seymour, the homeless street guy who got KOd by delapidated 60 year old Hollywood actor Mickey Rourke in his triumphant return to the boxing ring.

I thought it was Morgan Freeman playing Floyd Sr....

[Stuarty]

Raging bull is insanely overrated

I loved that movie, no matter what. I don't care wether it's considered a masterpiece or not, as long as I liked it.

Scorsese has done a more defining movie in Taxi Driver, and Goodfellas made him definitely a cultural icon, but I still consider Raging Bull one of the highest peaks in Scorsese's career.

Now what's really overrated is Rocky... talk about this: watching that movie is like tasting a slice of bread spread with butter, marmalade and sugar, drowned in honey.
It draws the stereotyped concepts of: boxing, Italians, and cheap philosophy, all in one movie.

I like the Rocky films but I get where you're coming from. It created a generation of new boxing fans though.....

[squiggy]

Raging bull is insanely overrated

I loved that movie, no matter what. I don't care wether it's considered a masterpiece or not, as long as I liked it.

Scorsese has done a more defining movie in Taxi Driver, and Goodfellas made him definitely a cultural icon, but I still consider Raging Bull one of the highest peaks in Scorsese's career.

Now what's really overrated is Rocky... talk about this: watching that movie is like tasting a slice of bread spread with butter, marmalade and sugar, drowned in honey.
It draws the stereotyped concepts of: boxing, Italians, and cheap philosophy, all in one movie.

I'm completely with this take on the two movies. (Though I like Taxi Driver and Goodfellas more than Raging Bull.) Rocky is only good in the sense that an eat-some-candy, try-to-finger-your-date movie can be good. But so far as quality film goes, I'm sure I'd take Scorsese's old home movies over everything Stallone has ever done.

[Jacopodb]

Raging bull is insanely overrated

I loved that movie, no matter what. I don't care wether it's considered a masterpiece or not, as long as I liked it.

Scorsese has done a more defining movie in Taxi Driver, and Goodfellas made him definitely a cultural icon, but I still consider Raging Bull one of the highest peaks in Scorsese's career.

Now what's really overrated is Rocky... talk about this: watching that movie is like tasting a slice of bread spread with butter, marmalade and sugar, drowned in honey.
It draws the stereotyped concepts of: boxing, Italians, and cheap philosophy, all in one movie.

I'm completely with this take on the two movies. (Though I like Taxi Driver and Goodfellas more than Raging Bull.) Rocky is only good in the sense that an eat-some-candy, try-to-finger-your-date movie can be good. But so far as quality film goes, I'm sure I'd take Scorsese's old home movies over everything Stallone has ever done.

Stallone is obviously very limited: I've heard that Pacino was offered the role in First Blood/Rambo, declined, then it was given to Stallone. That made pretty much Sly's fortune. Now "Rambo" was honest entertainment. Pure 70's-solid-stuff. Like Deliverance, for example... stuff new generations have guiltily forgot.

I graduated from a film-school (technically a Bachelor of Arts, with a branch in "movie-and-TV-directing"...), and a professor had us watching Taxi Driver: that's how important it can be, and, as far as I'm concerned, it's objectively Scorsese's best movie, as well as the most defining, of course (with all due respect for the rest).
I enjoyed very much Goodfellas, of course, how could any adult human being not do?

[Nile4000]

I loved that movie, no matter what. I don't care wether it's considered a masterpiece or not, as long as I liked it.

Scorsese has done a more defining movie in Taxi Driver, and Goodfellas made him definitely a cultural icon, but I still consider Raging Bull one of the highest peaks in Scorsese's career.

Now what's really overrated is Rocky... talk about this: watching that movie is like tasting a slice of bread spread with butter, marmalade and sugar, drowned in honey.
It draws the stereotyped concepts of: boxing, Italians, and cheap philosophy, all in one movie.

I'm completely with this take on the two movies. (Though I like Taxi Driver and Goodfellas more than Raging Bull.) Rocky is only good in the sense that an eat-some-candy, try-to-finger-your-date movie can be good. But so far as quality film goes, I'm sure I'd take Scorsese's old home movies over everything Stallone has ever done.

Stallone is obviously very limited: I've heard that Pacino was offered the role in First Blood/Rambo, declined, then it was given to Stallone. That made pretty much Sly's fortune. Now "Rambo" was honest entertainment. Pure 70's-solid-stuff. Like Deliverance, for example... stuff new generations have guiltily forgot.

I graduated from a film-school (technically a Bachelor of Arts, with a branch in "movie-and-TV-directing"...), and a professor had us watching Taxi Driver: that's how important it can be, and, as far as I'm concerned, it's objectively Scorsese's best movie, as well as the most defining, of course (with all due respect for the rest).
I enjoyed very much Goodfellas, of course, how could any adult human being not do?

Don't see Al doing the job in Rambo that Stallone did. He was the perfect fit.

[oogiebe]

I'm completely with this take on the two movies. (Though I like Taxi Driver and Goodfellas more than Raging Bull.) Rocky is only good in the sense that an eat-some-candy, try-to-finger-your-date movie can be good. But so far as quality film goes, I'm sure I'd take Scorsese's old home movies over everything Stallone has ever done.

Stallone is obviously very limited: I've heard that Pacino was offered the role in First Blood/Rambo, declined, then it was given to Stallone. That made pretty much Sly's fortune. Now "Rambo" was honest entertainment. Pure 70's-solid-stuff. Like Deliverance, for example... stuff new generations have guiltily forgot.

I graduated from a film-school (technically a Bachelor of Arts, with a branch in "movie-and-TV-directing"...), and a professor had us watching Taxi Driver: that's how important it can be, and, as far as I'm concerned, it's objectively Scorsese's best movie, as well as the most defining, of course (with all due respect for the rest).
I enjoyed very much Goodfellas, of course, how could any adult human being not do?

Don't see Al doing the job in Rambo that Stallone did. He was the perfect fit.

Seriously, it was an action hero movie not a dramatic role.

[Nile4000]

Stallone is obviously very limited: I've heard that Pacino was offered the role in First Blood/Rambo, declined, then it was given to Stallone. That made pretty much Sly's fortune. Now "Rambo" was honest entertainment. Pure 70's-solid-stuff. Like Deliverance, for example... stuff new generations have guiltily forgot.

I graduated from a film-school (technically a Bachelor of Arts, with a branch in "movie-and-TV-directing"...), and a professor had us watching Taxi Driver: that's how important it can be, and, as far as I'm concerned, it's objectively Scorsese's best movie, as well as the most defining, of course (with all due respect for the rest).
I enjoyed very much Goodfellas, of course, how could any adult human being not do?

Don't see Al doing the job in Rambo that Stallone did. He was the perfect fit.

Seriously, it was an action hero movie not a dramatic role.

Understood, but still there are certain things Pacino doesn't need to be un.

[oogiebe]

Don't see Al doing the job in Rambo that Stallone did. He was the perfect fit.

Seriously, it was an action hero movie not a dramatic role.

Understood, but still there are certain things Pacino doesn't need to be un.

I was agreeing with you.

[Jacopodb]

I'm completely with this take on the two movies. (Though I like Taxi Driver and Goodfellas more than Raging Bull.) Rocky is only good in the sense that an eat-some-candy, try-to-finger-your-date movie can be good. But so far as quality film goes, I'm sure I'd take Scorsese's old home movies over everything Stallone has ever done.

Stallone is obviously very limited: I've heard that Pacino was offered the role in First Blood/Rambo, declined, then it was given to Stallone. That made pretty much Sly's fortune. Now "Rambo" was honest entertainment. Pure 70's-solid-stuff. Like Deliverance, for example... stuff new generations have guiltily forgot.

I graduated from a film-school (technically a Bachelor of Arts, with a branch in "movie-and-TV-directing"...), and a professor had us watching Taxi Driver: that's how important it can be, and, as far as I'm concerned, it's objectively Scorsese's best movie, as well as the most defining, of course (with all due respect for the rest).
I enjoyed very much Goodfellas, of course, how could any adult human being not do?

Don't see Al doing the job in Rambo that Stallone did. He was the perfect fit.

Al Pacino is, as far as I'm concerned, the most talented actor I've ever seen on a screen (in terms of sheer, pure, raw talent, not acting technique): he could read any cheap-diner menu and make it sound like poetry.

We are accustomed to see Stallone as "Rambo"and we like it, and there must have been a reason why Al refused the role... but Al could have done it no-less than fair: there's a huge emotional climax in the movie, and that's just bread for Al Pacino's teeth.

P. S.: De Niro could've done great too, as Rambo: a sort of Deer Hunter with warfare skills beyond imagination...

[DrDuke]

A movie about Duran was so-so, cause it was too short for all the events presented there. And I agree with the opinion about hagiographic nature of biopics. "Ali" movie indeed sucked because of it. There also was "The Great White Hope", which is a story about Jack Johnson, but for some reason the names of real boxers were changed, including Johnson's one, he was Jack Jefferson there. So, that movie was probably the worst example of this "hagiographying" alongside with "The Hurricane".

I'm actually not a big fan of movies about boxing overall, not only biopics, but I watched a lot of them maybe because of curiosity. Boxing itself often looks absurd in them. "Rocky" franchise is ridiculous because of exactly this problem. It's really overrated, only the first part was good.