A sterling stallion

Reviewed - Rocky Balboa:  When the members of the International Coven of Film Critics heard that Sylvester Stallone was to return as both Rocky and Rambo their rejoicing was loud and frenzied. Pursuits such as shooting fish in barrels or barn-door hunting would, they imagined, seem arduous in comparison with the prospect of skewering the undoubtedly ghastly entities soon to be laid before them.

Well, against the odds, Rocky Balboa, the sixth film in the cycle, turns out to be a perfectly agreeable piece of work. Stallone, director, writer and star, has set aside the vulgarities of the later sequels and returned to the low-key, sentimental drama that won the first picture its Oscars. Rocky Balboa is far from subtle and, George Forman's late renaissance noted, the aging hero's return to the ring fairly strains credibility, but it would take a very hard heart indeed not to be moved by this unpretentious little treatise on the dying of the light.

As the film begins, we discover Rocky occupying territory a little closer to middle-class comfort than genuine hard times. He still lives in a humble apartment in a crumbling district of Philadelphia, but his Italian restaurant, named for his now late wife Adrian, appears to be doing reasonably well.

Still, there are holes in his life. Rocky's son, a yuppie of dated aspect, seems somewhat ashamed of his old pop and the fighter's only close buddy remains his grumpy brother-in-law Paulie (Burt Young, as ever). It is, therefore, not altogether surprising that Rocky accepts the offer to engage in an exhibition bout with the current champion.

Viewers of a certain age will, undoubtedly, feel pounding rushes of nostalgia as Stallone, accompanied by Bill Conti's irresistible fanfare, takes us through the franchise's key sequences: the charge up the City Hall steps, the training montage, the triumphant advance toward the ring. But Rocky Balboa is notable for the several modest ways in which it defies expectations. The hero's tentative relationship with a local bartender, played winningly by the Belfast-born actress Geraldine Hughes, never progresses beyond friendship.

More surprisingly still, Stallone refuses to put his hero in the way of any contrived jeopardy. He is not in danger of losing his restaurant. Paulie fails to find any blot clots that - a punch connecting inconveniently - might lead to the slugger's immediate demise.

Maybe this lessons the tension. But the freedom from serious hazard allows the film to potter to its inevitable conclusion in persuasively relaxed fashion. Rocky Balboa really is a pleasant surprise. Mind you, if Rambo IV: Pearl of the Cobra doesn't suck I'll eat my own head.