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Amazingly, this is the first Rocky I’ve ever sat through, even though R1 came out when I was in high school. This is certainly a grand valedictory for Sly’s seminal character.

Poignance, glory, Denzel: three ingredients that make Titans a great football movie. Poignant as in funny and affecting, glorious as in achieving great and meaningful victories, Denzel as in pure movie star charisma.

“Jesse Owens, American Hero” are four words that were imprinted in my mind from an early age. Jackie Robinson stands with him as an icon of African-American greatness, and therefore of American greatness, but Jesse Owens came first, by a lot. Plus he won not just one but four Gold Medals and did …

Not a disaster, but you won’t be missing much if you skip this one. It was filmed as if they came up with the action sequences first, then cobbled a lame story to tie it together. Except the writing part fails miserablly. Oh well.

Perhaps a movie past its time – when the Dallas Cowboys were TV America’s Team – but a rousing and funny movie nonetheless. Notable for a classic Nick Nolte man’s man performance, football action that for the first time seemed real, and a whiff of the larger changes going in 1970’s society outsi…