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| Conti |
Rocky III: (Bill Conti) One thing about the
Rocky franchise was certain: as Rocky Balboa achieved greater and
greater fame and thus became a spectacle of mainstream media, so too did
the film franchise depicting him degenerate into a show rather than a
story. Lead actor Sylvester Stallone, who once again wrote and directed
the sequel, attempted to maintain this realistic and honest assessment
of the sport of boxing (as well as the encroaching entertainment value
of professional wrestling) while not losing touch with the sentimental
aspects of Rocky's personal life. Along with the death of his mentor and
trainer, a surprising and growing friendship with former adversary
Apollo Creed extends the personal narrative. The
Rocky phenomenon
was still running strong into the 1980's, now enjoying a significantly
larger budget while yielding returns in the hundreds of millions of
dollars. Even more than
Rocky IV, the 1982 entry of
Rocky
III is perhaps best remembered for its introduction of favorite
character actors to movie-goers; both Mr. T and Hulk Hogan were destined
for successful careers after their roles in this picture. With the
franchise proven financially, Stallone had a few more resources from
which to draw for the soundtrack for
Rocky III as well. The
involvement of Bill Conti for the score was an obvious choice (Stallone
hailed the composer's similar Italian roots), though he would not have
the opportunity to write a new pop and symphonic-blended song for a
third time. Instead, Stallone asked the rock group Survivor to write the
now infamous song "Eye of the Tiger," named after the secondary title of
the film and an element of Apollo's training of Rocky in the narrative's
latter half. Topping the charts as a single for several weeks and
returning a
Rocky album to the limelight, the song's opening
thirty seconds have since become a normal anthem for large-scale
sporting events. It represented the film's only Academy Award
nomination, however, placing some perspective on how far the franchise
had fallen in the minds of industry establishment. Indeed, some of the
personal touch of the original film was lost, the inspiration turned
wholesale for the purposes of flashier entertainment. The memorable
Survivor song, despite its obvious, lasting popularity, testifies to
this shift. Not surprisingly, Stallone also turned to his brother for an
even greater role in
Rocky III; not only is the "Take You Back"
song reprised in two forms for the soundtrack, but Frank performs the
more contemporary (and a bit obnoxious) "Pushin'" as well.
Unfortunately,
Rocky III experiences a greater
disconnect between its music on screen and that on its album when
compared to its predecessors. Not only is the version of "Eye of the
Tiger" on the album different (technically, the film edit was considered
a demo), but the instrumental adaptation of that song for the training
of Rocky by Apollo is also missing from the album. Conti's score wasn't
particularly well served by the album, either. The
Rocky LPs (and
later identical CD releases) were never long, always running just a tad
over thirty minutes, and this brevity especially hurts Conti's work for
Rocky III. Most of the material on the album is simply a reprise
(in contents and even sometimes name) of what was previously released
from the first two albums, thus making this soundtrack a "best of"
highlight product. The redemption theme from
Rocky II is absent,
as are both the adversity and victory themes from both previous scores.
The love theme and its adaptation into a family theme in
Rocky II
are extended to the material for both Adrian and the death of Mickey,
Rocky's original trainer. These two cues in
Rocky III, "Mickey"
and "Adrian," are its only truly interesting and original six minutes of
music, a good match for the two equally pretty symphonic cues from
Rocky II on any compilation of Conti's fluffier side. Both cues
offer fragments of the "Gonna Fly Now" fanfare theme, the latter in
appealingly snazzy form. The only other unique material to be heard in
the score is the two-minute, dissonant, electronic cue "Reflections,"
which had no business making it onto this album. Other Conti cues in
Rocky III are straight reprises, including "Decision" (named
"Reflections" in
Rocky and still containing that absolutely
awful, synthetic pitch effect that rises through the octaves), "Gonna
Fly Now" (the original
Rocky recording), and "Conquest"
(representing
Rocky II and Apollo). Otherwise, there's really
nothing of note to mention about the
Rocky III album. It's a poor
representation of the score despite being the last good offering of
Conti's contribution to the franchise during its original five-picture
run. The sound quality did pick up in both
Rocky II and
Rocky
III, though an available remastering of
Rocky helped
alleviate the previously significant difference in clarity (especially
in the string section of the orchestra). If you want to create the best
compilation of material from Conti's first three scores in the series,
though, you really do need to include at least the "Mickey" cue from
Rocky III, and "Eye of the Tiger" is an obvious plus. Until this
score receives better album treatment, however, it's definitely less
attractive than its predecessors.
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The insert includes no extra information about the score or film (in fact, the
interior of the insert is almost completely blank).
