The most pervasive action star of the 1970s and the 1980s, Sylvester Stallone became renowned for his depictions of inarticu-late, larger-than-life heroes, most notably the lovable pugilist Rocky Balboa, and the alienated Vietnam War veteran John Rambo. As a creative force, who wrote/directed/produced many of his movies, he also became a favorite target of critics, who took aim at the overt sentimentality of the formulaic Rocky sequels, and at the revisionist politics of the Rambo series. Yet Stallone triumphed with audiences, to become one of the biggest movie stars in the world.

Not coincidentally, the Hollywood anomaly rose to fame in the shadow of the Watergate scandal. Amid the cynicism of the 1970s, moviegoers flocked to Rocky, the uplifting 1976 saga of the Philadelphia southpaw, also known as the Italian Stallion, who inadvertently gets a shot at the title. The year's sleeper hit...