When people talk about the power of cinema, the best example is Rocky's training montage which is uplifting, powerful, and unforgettable. Not just an outstanding boxing film, it also has the romance of a lifetime with an all-time great ending. Terrific acting and direction transcend Rocky into a moving motion picture for all people.

"To survive a war, you gotta become war." So it goes in Rambo: First Blood Part II. Sylvester Stallone has never been more thrilling as he was in this film. It's the role that made him a worldwide icon. My favorite line of the movie is on the definition of expendable: "It's like someone invites you to a party and you don't show up. It doesn't really matter."

Can anything be more exciting than Cobra? It's maybe the most aesthetic neo-noir picture made. Sylvester Stallone has outdone himself this time by creating one of the coolest characters in movie history through Marion Cobretti, the pride of the Zombie Squad. He takes on an army of killers, saving the best for last with the Night Slasher in an epic fight at the foundry.

James Mangold must have called Martin Scorsese and asked, "Can you give me the guys from Mean Streets, Raging Bull, and Goodfellas?" And Marty said, "Hell, yes!!!" Sylvester Stallone makes a serious comeback and has a surreal meeting with Robert De Niro while Ray Liotta, Harvey Keitel, Robert Patrick, and Arthur J. Nascarella bring a hard edge to the story.

The franchise enjoyed a nice resurgence when Sylvester Stallone came back to reprise his role in Rocky V with John G. Avildsen reclaiming the director chair. The acting is much improved this time with excellent supporting work by Tommy Morrison as Tommy Gunn and Richard Gant as George Washington Duke, an imitation of Don King in the flesh. Unforgettable is the street fight between Rocky and Tommy Gunn.

Thanks to Sylvester Stallone and Antonio Banderas, Assassins is a lot of fun to watch. The story is clever that's made better by the flashback of Robert Rath's assassination of Nicolai which caused him deep regret. Whoever thought of Antonio Banderas for Miguel Bain is a genius. The actor took Assassins to another level.

Rocky II is a phenomenal boxing movie. Apollo Creed is a great champion. Rocky Balboa was in the match of his career with him, and he showed heart by winning it. The training montage is a can't-beat when Rocky ran up the steps with the children at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

"Don't push it, or I'll give you a war you won't believe!" The uniqueness of Sylvester Stallone is captured in First Blood, a one-man guerilla war film. Not only that, but a battle is also waged between his character and the elements of nature. It's a good yarn of how one man's stubbornness can cost more than it's worth sticking to.

If there's anything memorable, it has to be the breathtaking introduction when Sarah meets her fate in a spectacular fall. Sylvester Stallone has so many great rock climbing scenes that they're worth the price of admission. It's why the movie was a box-office hit, thanks to the potential viewers having been sold by the trailer.

Forget the kid, and forget the sob story. The arm wrestling is where the action is in Over the Top. "You got guys from M.I.T., and you got guys who can't spell M.I.T." It has no equal: pure testosterone bleeds everywhere as arm wrestlers eat cigars, drink motor oil, and trash-talk that are backed by pounds of muscle, intense mentality, and do-or-die attitudes.

Having an enormously tall order to try to top the sequel, Rambo III is quite good. If you thought the body count was high the last time, it's now even higher, which is twice as much, setting a Guinness World Record as the most violent film. Thanks to the helicopters, the editing is still outstanding. There's nothing fake about anything except for the location; they used real bombs, gunfire, explosions, tanks, and helicopters, and Sylvester Stallone did his own stunts in the middle of them all.

Shot on location in East Jersey State Prison (formerly Rahway State Prison), the extras are real prisoners and guards, providing the look. Sylvester Stallone is the man while Predator's Sonny Landham matches him intensity for insensity. The story is great and entirely believable with terrific editing and many Stallone moments. In prison, you have decent guys versus stone-cold killers.

Stallone, Pelé, and other international soccer stars take on the Nazis for a game of soccer. That's one half of it, and the other half is The Great Escape plan. The most impressive sight is Pelé doing a bicycle kick. No matter what time of the day is, Victory is an entertaining WWII soccer picture that simply defies logic.

"Send a maniac to catch a maniac." Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes on the same screen? Great. Perfect. Super fun. Most sci-fi pictures tend to have at best three to six novel concepts and then struggle to fill in the rest of the time to be remotely entertaining. But not this one. There's always something new every few minutes. Some of the stuff have turned out to be true, and the others remain to be seen.

Standing at a good half foot taller, Ivan Drago famously says to Rocky, "I must break you," and the rest is history for Dolph Lundgren. Character-wise, Sylvester Stallone is in better form than he was in Rocky III. His training montage that's intercut with Dolph's is a lot better and more exciting, too.

It's a thrilling action policier with Sylvester Stallone at his classic best. Rutger Hauer looks to be in tip-top shape. The battle between Stallone's and Hauer's characters is the most impressive part of Nighthawks. One great movie moment is when, inside the discotheque, Sylvester Stallone stared at Rutger Hauer for a long time, immediately knowing what's happening.

Tango & Cash still doesn't get the respect it deserves, featuring one of the most electrifying on-screen chemistry between Kurt Russell and Sylvester Stallone. They're like fire and kerosene. Put these two together, and the screen ignites. The comedy works because of the way they feed off each other so well.

Bringing back good memories of the 70's disaster pictures, Daylight is a respectable entry into the genre. A major flaw of such films is too much star power; the more big names there are in the cast, the worse the overall product is. But that's not the case in Daylight which is The Poseidon Adventure meets Cliffhanger. Plus, the Stallone effect is hard to beat.