PARADISE ALLEY

Sylvester Stallone surely has a colorful imagination and a wonky sense of humor, and somehow (even in the most flawed of his movies) it works for him.

I only bought Paradise Alley because it was $2 and I thought the cover art (featuring a young Sylvester Stallone) was foxy. Once I got it home, I had an awful realization—the movie itself didn't look very good. It seemed like it would be kind of dated and low-budget, and it is, but when you get right down to it, it's not bad.

The first thing you'll notice when you sit down to watch Paradise Alley is that Sylvester is totally singing the title song. You may have a moment of pause where you think, "Wait, maybe it's Frank, the ubiquitously musical Stallone brother," but then you'll remember the Rhinestone soundtrack album you've got in your bedroom, and the truth will be clear: it's all Sly. He's not an awful singer or anything—I'm just always thrown by the idea of him doing anything Rambo wouldn't do. (Incidentally, don't worry about Frank—he'll show up as a lounge singer later in the movie, I promise.)

The film takes place in Hell's Kitchen during the 1940s, and centers on the Carboni brothers. Victor (Lee Canalito) delivers ice, Lenny (Armand Assante) works in a morgue, and Cosmo (Sylvester Stallone) dabbles in everything from busking to begging to betting. He's the least grounded of the three, but his intense desire for a better life may just be their ticket out of town. He longs to live on a houseboat in New Jersey, and is constantly needling his brothers about moving up in the world. He's willing to try just about anything to get a leg up, so you can imagine his excitement when he stumbles into Paradise Alley on Christmas Eve. If he can get Victor to get into the wrestling ring, there's a good chance they'll take home the purse. Possessing far more brawn than brains, Victor succeeds, and suddenly Cosmo can see a way out.

After much ado, Cosmo convinces Lenny to be Victor's manager, and they set about turning Victor into an official wrestling star. He needs a good wrestling name like Hulk or Jake the Snake, so they go with "The Salami", and sometimes they make him an extra-awesome costume with, um, actual salami safety-pinned to it. It's all a little low-end, but Victor's wrestling career does take off, and suddenly the sensible, soft-spoken Lenny is full of attitude. He gets over the war injury that left him with a limp, goes back to his old girlfriend Annie (Anne Archer), and starts pushing Victor harder and harder. Poor Cosmo, who had been courting Annie as well, is left trying to put on the brakes and mend his heart. He wants out of Hell's Kitchen, but not at Victor's expense. He's the one who looks at The Salami and sees the gentle giant who sings to his pet bird in the morning (to the tune of "Frere Jacques"):

Please eat Bella
Please eat Bella
Eat the seeds
Chew them up

And maybe that's annoying at the crack of dawn when it goes on and on without any sort of harmony. Maybe Victor is kind of a big lug who needs things explained to him a lot, but that doesn't mean they can just watch him beat his brains out on the wrestling mat. Not only is he their brother, he's about the sweetest guy you'd ever want to know.

Just when you're convinced that Victor's going to die, and Lenny and Cosmo are poised to lose about $25,000 they don't have, the tide turns. We should expect no less from a film written and directed by Sylvester Stallone, but this movie is so bleak that it seems impossible. Paradise Alley isn't quite as polished as Rocky, but it proves that when you have nothing, you're not afraid to risk it all. It's a triumphant little story, and there's even a short Unconventional Training Sequence wherein Cosmo advises Victor to throw some heavy trash (including a "dumper" a.k.a. toilet) into the river to build his muscles. See? It's just like the time Rocky lifted logs over his head! And isn't it a crying shame that "dumper" didn't enter America's vernacular? Sylvester Stallone surely has a colorful imagination and a wonky sense of humor, and somehow (even in the most flawed of his movies) it works for him.