Reviews

Without dissecting the plot and character development, etc., which appears to already have been done to everyone's satisfaction, I'll just make a couple of brief remarks. I remember when I first saw Rocky I at the campus theater while attending College in 1975. That movie, along with Network received much critical acclaim that year, however only Rocky appears to have withstood the test of time, and is as hard hitting now as it was way back then. Consequently, I have been a Rocky fan ever since, and now, I actually feel like these characters have been part of my life for 30 years. Today I cried all the way through Rocky Balboa and at the end of the film I remained in my seat emotionally exhausted. Sometimes I couldn't even breath. Something touched me deep inside and, even now, reading other's reviews here are beginning to bring back some of the emotions, and I will probably see it again before Christmas. I can't think of another movie that has ever done this to me. I think that pretty much says it all.

It's been a while since I've seen this film but I believe that you have to judge it for what it is (or was). First, it is very 1950's. Low budget 'B' movie probably shot and filmed in a matter of days and on a shoe sting budget, in an era when the big studios cranked these things off the assembly line. But what I remember most about the movie is how seductive was Mari Blanchard. You have to see the opening scene of her dancing and flirting around a little diner to music on a juke box. Albeit her character was cheap and bawdy, something comes across on the celluloid that moved me, and I think that had it not been for her untimely death, her career may have really opened up. The movie itself is a love triangle trapped in a stupid little plot, but amidst the backdrop and supposed romance of the crop dusters of the day, which were common in the 1950's, when America was a little more rural and agricultural, and with all the fly-boys returning from WWII and pursuing said nomadic lifestyle. Also, possibly one of the first films to deal with a female stalking a male, maybe not quite in the vain of Fatal Attraction but at least helping blaze the trail a bit. The movie could be described as terrible, but it's so bad that it almost compels you to watch it, like some Ed Wood films were famous for.