Directed By Michael B. Jordan

Starring – Michael B. Jordan, Tessa Thompson, Jonathan Majors

The Plot – After dominating the boxing world, Adonis Creed (Jordan) has been thriving in both his career and family life. When childhood friend and former boxing prodigy Damian (Majors) resurfaces after serving a long sentence in prison, he is eager to prove that he deserves his shot in the ring. The face off between former friends is more than just a fight. To settle the score, Adonis must put his future on the line to battle Damian–a fighter who has nothing to lose.

Rated PG-13 for intense sports action, violence and some strong adult language.

CREED III | Official Trailer – YouTube

POSITIVES

After two thrilling installments that helped reshape the franchise, Jordan takes the helm as its steering captain, supplanting what is easily the most personal chapter of the Creed franchise, with a scope and style that if nothing else prove his capabilities as a visionary behind the lens. Decorated with meaningful imagery, symmetrical shot compositions, and splashes of intoxicating color, “Creed 3” takes pride in feeling so much like any other installment, almost to the point of completely reinventing the franchise once more in the hands of its titular protagonist-turned-director, however Jordan maintains the combination of heart and humiliation for the engagement that we’ve come to expect in the nine films of this franchise, with three-dimensional characters whose motivations above all else feel enriched with humanity. However, what Jordan does best is easily the spectacle of the ring itself, with promotional interviews under the helm of HBO Sports and ESPN, but also immersive fight sequences that I truly feel are second to none in the way they captivate the attention of their audience. The fight choreography is crisp, with blanketed sound design and razor sharp editing instilling a swiftly stinging sensation, and the astonishing over-the-shoulder cinematography here from longtime Creed-collaborator Kramer Morgenthu helps us register every devastating blow with impact that constantly doubles down on the stakes and circumstances of those invested. Beyond his direction in the ring, his work outside of it is equally merited, although sifting through a timultuous screenplay that does his story very few favors along the way. One aspect that I truly appreciated was the continuity in the apparent extended universe, which not only brought forth a few returning surprises from past fights, but also made this boxing circuit feel enriched with lived-in emphasis that the Rocky films never even attempted to conquer. This not only provides insight to the future of this franchise, to which Jordan has confirmed in recent media interviews, but also helps illustrate evolution in the supporting characters who we typically don’t follow, with one character in particular given a redemption arc that I truly applauded. As for performances, it’s no big shock that the work of Jordan and especially Banks are mesmerizing, outlining two characters with similar backgrounds who couldn’t be any more different in the foreground of the narrative, but it’s what each of them does with the nuances of the respective roles that cement them as their own, in turn harvesting a complex chemistry that made shared scenes the most entertaining of the entire film. Jordan’s growing maturity to Adonis is most evident in this installment, coming into his own in balancing the warmth of the loving family man with the ruthless competitor inside of the ring, all while juggling the most vulnerability inside of mental warfare that we’ve ever seen from the character. For Banks, that dynamic is a little less honorable, speaking with somber-but-stern deliveries that never wither your attention donned to the character, but more importantly an underlining influence of jealousy and resentment that lurks just below the uneasy smiles that he continuously conveys above the surface, illustrating him as a ticking time bomb that could and inevitably will blow at any given moment.

NEGATIVES

This film is far from perfect, or even the best of the Creed trilogy of films, and where that’s felt the most is within the confines of this screenplay and overlooked execution with Jordan’s debut directing effort that could’ve used a more experienced hand in juggling so much. This is a loaded screenplay, packed to the brim with many characters and ensuing subplots all fighting for time, but with only half of them receiving what they so forcefully desire. This leaves certain other storylines concerning dramatic heft to fall a bit flat in the emotions that they’re straining so heavily for, while other times making the evolving drama between conflicts feel undercooked and thinly motivated in ways that make them feel improperly melodramatic for arcs that are otherwise ripe with emotions and gravitational dynamics. In particular, Damian’s eventual turn feels a bit like a soap opera, beginning with chord-swelling scores that meander the mean and unforgiving man within him, before ending on a bonfire beach party that feels like it easily could’ve been attended by Patrick Swayze or any of his bank-robbing surfers from “Point Break”. Creatively it’s all a bit too familiar, and tonally with everything this franchise has spent two films fleshing out, it’s a bit too silly, reaching for the lowest hanging fruit in dramatic heft that ultimately and unfortunately defined some of the weakest chapters in the Rocky franchise. Beyond this, my only other major problem with the film came from the pacing itself, which unnaturally proceeded the storytelling in ways that frequently felt abrupt throughout. Truthfully, 111 minutes simply isn’t enough to naturally evolve so many ensuing arcs, but considering the first act takes the longest to properly digest, with a linear narrative at a past timeline that runs simultaneously with the current day narrative, it leaves the other two acts strained for sequencing, where the final fight, unfortunately, feels most compromising as a result of this consequence, where we experience three rounds of an eleven round fight. This is certainly nothing new, as Rocky films never aired the entire fight blow for blow, but they did feature a montage to convey the compelling drama and the struggle for power between the two fighters, and without that here, we have to rely a bit too heavily on the overhead narration of the fight’s commentators, which tells far too much than it shows.

OVERALL
“Creed III” outlasts the brunt of its self-inflicting mistakes for a stylistically stimulating installment that supplants Jordan as a new contender for visionary direction. Though the film and its arcs feel a bit strained for time inside of the franchise’s briefest allowance yet, leading to familiar paths with half of the impact, the turns from Jordan and especially series newcomer Jonathan Banks help to maintain the grip on heart and humanity inside of a narrative, with some of the series-best designed fight sequences at their punishing disposal.

My Grade: 7/10 or B-