Top 25 Outdoor Movie: Rocky (Original 1976)

As we move down the Top 25 Outdoor Movies of All Time list, our next stop is Rocky, the 1976 movie that won 3 Oscars including best picture, and made Sylvester Stallone's career. Here is the original trailer for the film:

Rocky was written by and starred Sylvester Stallone, who plays Rocky Balboa, a small-time boxer and a collector for a loan shark in Philadelphia. Rocky gets the chance of a lifetime when the World Heavyweight Champion chooses him to fight when his opponent is injured before the scheduled bout.

Rocky trains hard, and to practice his moves, he punches animal carcasses at a meat packing factory that his friend works at during the night. Before the big fight, Rocky tells his girlfriend that all he wants to do is to go the distance with Creed (the World Heavyweight Champion), which is to fight him a full 15 rounds - a feat that has never been completed by any boxer.

Rocky is a film that will really bring out a big crowd, and will leave your community inspired. Rocky is rated PG for some violence and language, but is probably not for small children for entertainment purposes.

It would make a really great selection, however, as a university or college campus movie, or for high school or youth groups. The film is well known enough that you'll get a big crowd, but is also vintage enough that you won't have people not coming because they've recently seen it.

There are some excellent opportunities for pre-movie activities and general themes. With the right resources (and donations from a few local businesses), you could have inflatable fighting gear- with an inflatable boxing ring and all! Often times your event producer (if you rent your equipment) will also rent out inflatable bounce houses and items like fighting rings.

This would be a really fun activity that would help create a thematic atmosphere for your outdoor movie screening that will be memorable for your community members.

If anyone has screened Rocky as an outdoor movie, we'd love to hear from you and would love to share your story with the rest of the outdoor movie community! Email us at community@openaircinema.us