The little below-radar movie, shot out of the back of a van on the streets of Philadelphia, was a monster hit ($117 million in bicentennial dollars), and an unlikely nominee for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. On Oscar night, Rocky was a long shot again, against the favored Taxi Driver, Network and All the President’s Men, movies that captured New York and Washington, D.C., just as resonantly as Rocky captured Philadelphia. And Rocky not only went the distance, it won. 
“I know I’ll never have a voice like that again, where I can just speak whatever I feel in my heart,” Stallone says. “That’s one thing I’ll always cherish about that character, because if I say it you won’t believe it, but when Rocky says it, you know it’s the truth.” (source :totalrocky.com)
