Rocky IV (1985)




Dolph Lundgren - Rocky IV

Sylvester Stallone - Rocky IV

Sylvester Stallone - Rocky IV


Sylvester Stallone - Rocky IV




The "Iron Curtain" is starting to come down around the Soviet Union under the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev. A Soviet boxer named Ivan Drago, nicknamed "The Siberian Express", comes to the United States with his wife, a Russian champion swimmer and coach for a guest match. Drago is a superbly conditioned boxer who has been scientifically trained in the USSR, and he & his coach propose a fight against Rocky Balboa. Rocky's former adversary, Apollo Creed decides to take on Drago despite having been out of the ring for several years. Creed unwisely taunts Drago before the match, and after the first round, Drago issues a prophetic warning to Creed: "You will lose." Unfortunately the warning comes true and Creed dies following a pounding by the Siberian Express. When death threats are made against the Russian boxer, he returns to the USSR and states if there is to be a match between Balboa & Drago, it will be in the USSR. To honor Creed's memory, Rocky takes the Soviets up on their challenge and goes to Siberia to train for the match against the "Siberian Express", that will take place in Moscow on Christmas Day, in front of a hostile audience.


Books with substantial mentioning of Rocky IV

Frederick V. Romano
The Boxing Filmography, American Features, 1920-2003
Jefferson, North Carolina and London, 2004

James Robert Parish and George H. Hill
Black Action Films, Plots, Critiques, Casts and Credits for 235 Theatrical and Made-for-Television Releases
Jefferson, North Carolina, and London, 1989

Al Clark (editor)
The Film Yearbook 1997
New York, 1987

Frank N. Magill (ed.)
Magill's Cinema Annual 1986, A Survey of the Films of 1985
Pasadena, California; Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1986

Articles on Rocky IV

Lisl Walsh, "Italian Stallion" Meets "Breaker of Horses": Achilles and Hector in Rocky IV (1985), in: Monica S. Cyrino and Meredith E. Safran (eds.), Classical myth on screen, New York, 2015