Paradise Alley is set in 1946 in the dingy and dirty streets of Hell's Kitchen- or the Bowery, take your pick, maybe more like the Bowery- and is centered on a group of characters, specifically three brothers, and how they try to maintain in their squalor or, as it turns out, try and make a way for themselves to get out. It's a sentimental picture as it tries to act super tough and muscular, and it's kind of like a Saturday afternoon movie for the guys who have already seen Rocky and Rambo flicks too many times and want to see something sort of "different". It certainly is. And not always in a good way.

What I liked was seeing how the actors playing the brothers interacted. Cosmo, Victor and Lenny are impressionable and work very well as this trio dynamic. One had high aspirations and has a big mouth but a fairly good heart, another is a crippled war hero who's life has not worked out at all like he might have wanted for himself or his girl, and the other is a fairly content and BIG-sized ice delivery man who finds himself needing money to want that boat house. I liked also how Stallone put these characters against the lumbering idiot gangsters who were too bumbling to really make it as big-shots but could be threatening enough to other bums and the like in the neighborhood. Not to mention the character and performance of Frank McRae as the 40-something wrestler who lives in total degradation even as he's very good at what he does. Oh, and Tom Waits of course, for a role that is merely a blip but one that brings a smile all the same.

The problems seem to come for Stallone that he isn't confident enough to take the material where it needs to go as a down-and-dirty grungy street flick. He gussies it up with over-blown camera moves and editing tricks (I hated the freeze-screen effects used),and seem to not always be as strong with dealing with melodrama and the natural way people talk as he did in the first Rocky. If there was a time to make this story maybe it was right after he has his first big success, and then move on to more conventional stuff. But it is at times fairly schmaltzy, and not all of the acting is very good (the female actresses are all pretty weak, and for a couple of good scenes Lee Canalito feel really flat as the "happy" wreslter brother dubbed "The Salami"). Stallone and Asante fare better with the material, and even Stallone himself goes hammy with his own words in some scenes; Stallone is Stallone, not a Pacino or De Niro, so heavy-duty dramatic scenes don't seem to cut it out as well.

And yet, the film does have its moments. I especially dug that final wrestling match, the two contenders (the other being, I think, Terry Funk) duking it out as a rain storm is coming down in the arena and the power keeps cutting in and out with lightning effects thrown in. Stallone does make this an epic and nasty and brutal final bout, and it does bring a pretty satisfying completion to a film that is enjoyable but too clichéd by half.

Sylvester Stallone directed and produced as well as starred in Paradise Alley about three brothers named Carboni. Sly is a gladhanding con man of the first order. He might even have conned a 4F for himself to get out military service in World War II. Flat feet was a mighty subjective deferment back in the day.

Brother Armand Assante served however and now walk with a limp and is a bitter man now working as an undertaker. The youngest is a giant of a man Lee Canalito who works as an iceman. Carrying those blocks of ice up several tenement stories in Hell's Kitchen will develop your biceps.

When at Paradise Alley which is a local underground nightclub/sports arena Canalito wins an arm wrestling match with a local wrestler managed by the club owner Kevin Conway. It occurs first to Stallone that Canalito's physique and Rocky like training and dedication might be a way out of Hell's Kitchen. It starts to look that way, but the brothers themselves change in interesting ways.

I have to single out Frank McRae former football player who delivers a memorable performance as a down and out wrestler who lives on Conway's pocket change. His last scene with Stallone is memorable.

So is Conway. He's one nasty little customer, constantly using derogatory ethnic terms. Stallone made a very good point about the ethnic rivalries in working class neighborhoods like Hell's Kitchen. In the end Canalito embarrasses Conway, humiliates him more likely in a way that he will never be an intimidating figure again.

Paradise Alley might not have gathered the enduring following that Rocky did. But it is still a fine and enduring film.

Just found this film today and saw it for the first time huge Stallone fan and as i expected it the movie was awesome both sad and funny. I liked Cosmo (Stallone) but i think he tried to get advantage of others in order to make money but as the film reaches it's big finale this is were he realises Family is more important than all the money of the world also Armand Assante's role was pretty good also the younger brother who is the fighter was also pretty good on his role. Terry Funk WWE Legend also has a small role here and he is pretty cool. The film is directed by Sylvester Stallone and it reminds me a lot of Rocky but instead of Boxing there is Wrestling in it. If you love Stallone movies you definitely need to see this!!!