Creed - 2015

I liked it, it was well done, well written, a good movie. It was moving more than once, I love that they didn’t forget the story of the previous film, that the character is really the same; he’s an older Rocky, but it’s still him, and remembers all that happened, all the people he knew. There are a lot of moving scenes, but it’s also funny sometimes, like the scene when Donny is doing push-ups and Rocky tells him that “we used to do it one hand, I don’t wanna say anything but..” and Donny starts doing it one-hand. The scene when Donny’s ma watched his match at home supporting him was both touching and funny, and the relationship between Rocky and Donny grew very nicely, and they were really fighting together. Only thing is, when they climb the famous steps in Philadelphia and Rocky is tired, I understand what they meant but I also thought that Donny was pushing him too much.  
It starts with a boy in 1998; he’s in a reformatory when a woman (Mrs Creed-Phylicia Rashad) comes telling him that his father was her husband, and that she’d like him to go live with her. In 2015 he still lives with her, has a good job in Los Angeles but secretly goes to Mexico to fight. He works in a ‘financial group’ and gets promoted, but he quits instead. He watches the Apollo vs Rocky match on youtube. He lives in a very beautiful house, and his mother (she took him in and is now his mother, although she wasn’t his birth mother but was born when Apollo cheated on his wife) tells him that she doesn’t want him to fight. She doesn’t want to go through all that again.
Creed goes to Apollo’s old gym but they refused to take him in. He moves to Philadelphia looking for Rocky (Sylvester Stallone). 
Rocky fills remorse for Apollo’s death, thinks that if he had stopped the match Apollo would still be alive. He refuses to train Adonis at first but the guy is insistent so Rocky starts giving him advice. Adonis (Michael B. Jordan) keeps showing up, follows his advices, trains by himself at the gym and finally Rocky accepts and starts training him. The people there are surprised, he never accepted training anyone before. 
Rocky has Adonis doing all the exercises his way, like jumping the rope (of course, understandable), and running a lot and trying to catch chickens.. 
Adonis meets a girl, Bianca (Tessa Thompson) and they start a relationship. 
Adonis calls Rocky his uncle and goes to live with him. Rocky makes regular visits to the cemetery to talk to Paulie and Adriana. He has a son called Robert who lives in Vancouver. He takes Adonis to another gym because he’s about to fight against Leo of the other gym, Pete’s son. Rocky can’t train him all alone, so he needs more trainers to help him. 
Pete finds out that Adonis is Creed’s son after making phone calls to LA, and Rocky asks him to keep the secret as a personal favour. The match Donny vs Leo is won by Donny. 
Bianca is upset when she reads on the internet that Adonis is Creed’s son and he never told her. It’s all over the news, that he’s the result of Creed’s adultery, and poor Mrs Creed has to stand all that. 
English manager of boxer Ricky Conlan wants a match between Ricky and Donny, and Donny accepts because Rocky is on his side, but then while they are training together Rocky falls down, throws up, and is taken to a hospital. They tell Rocky that he has cancer and has to undergo chemotherapy, and has to start immediately. Rocky says that his wife did the chemotherapy but she died anyway and refuses the therapy. He doesn’t want Donny to know about it but he finds it out and is very angry when he learns that he doesn’t want the therapy. Donny goes to the club where Bianca is scheduled to perform and he starts a fight.. when Rocky goes to him Donny yells at him to go away, that he had his father killed... then Donny apologizes to Bianca who doesn’t accept the apology of course because someone can’t just go around starting fights, risking her career, and then make it right with a simple apology;  Donny explains to her the Rocky thing, that he had just discovered that he has cancer.. she’s very sorry, but she doesn’t let him in. He yells things like ‘I’m sorry, I trusted you, I need you, don’t push me away’ ...  then Donny is able to convince Rocky to accept the treatment, and they sort of do it together: Donny goes with him to the hospital and trains there while Rocky watches him. Rocky keeps training him and Donny takes care of him. 
Donny has serious anger issues. This was what I didn't like about him, but that's at a personal level: as a character I guess it was reasonable enough that he was like that, I suppose. Anyway the heart of the movie was not the relationship with Bianca, that only helped understand the character outside the boxing world, no the real heart of the movie is the growing relationship between Adonis and Rocky. Adonis has finally found the father figure that he was missing, and they love each other, and they help each other, and it's all very touching and nice.
Before the match, Rocky calls Bianca and she comes for Donny. His ma sends him new pants, like Creed’s pants but with both the names Creed and Johnson written on.
It’s time, the match with Conlan. Everybody’s watching, Donny is almost k.o., there’s a big speech from Rocky, things like you have to win because you’re a Creed and I love you, and Donny keeps going, with the Rocky music ... it’s not a k.o. after all, and Conlan wins at the points, but Creed surprised everyone, and it’s a sort of win for him too. For both Rocky and Donny. A good movie.

ITA Creed-nato per combattere