Don't sell this film short! There are more inaccuracies in this film then I care to mention, but the need for the unions of the day to enlist the underworld (mob) for their protection was real. Law enforcement was on the side of whoever could pay the most back in those days and the big business anti-Union folks had all the money. If you work for a living, you have to pay homage to the unions. If not for them we would all still be working for fifty cents a day!! This movie does do a great job of showing the good that the unions did and how they succumbed to the corruption that power and greed visit on any entity no mater the good intentions. Everyone who sells their labor to a business should watch this film.

This is one of Sylvester Stallone's most well developed and acted role of his early career. Stallone plays a character named Johnny Kovak which ought as well be Jimmy Hoffa.Kovak is a character who starts as a small time worker but after feeling him and his fellow co-workers are getting the shaft by management sets out to improve their working conditions. Soon he is working for the F.I.S.T.(Federal Interstates Truckers) union. As the years go by he's worked his way up to being the head of the union.The movie is unofficially basically the rise and fall of Jimmy Hoffa, I think it's a much better done movie then the movie Hoffa with Jack Nicholson in the title role.

F.I.S.T. is one of the few films out there that illustrate Sly Stallone's great acting talents. Stallone really brings his character, Johnny Kovak, to life and gives one of his most memorable performances. This film shows that, having gone a different route, Stallone could have become a much better actor. After this film, Stallone had a few other good films but the majority were crumby sequels, cliché action films, and poor attempts at comedy. It's really a shame he didn't put his talents to better use like he did in his earlier work like Rocky, and Nighthawks.The film begins in the Great Depression of the 30's and follows the life of Johnny Kovak, a labourer who works at unloading trucks. Who, with his coworkers after being severely mistreated, and underpaid fights back against the company. This leads to Kovak becoming a member of the Union F.I.S.T, the Federation of Innner-State Truckers. At first idealistic, Kovak's morals and values are challenged when he has to get organized crime groups involved to get what's fair.My only complaint with the film is, in the later scenes were Stallone plays an older Kovak, his portrayal is a bit weak given his limited acting abilities at the time. This, however is only a minor complaint, he still gives a great performance.The script is good, all the characters are realistic and well fleshed out,and the great director, Norman Jewison puts his talents to good use in F.I.S.T. Also, filled with a fantastic supporting cast (including, Peter Boyle, and Rod Steiger) all these elements come together to make F.I.S.T. a film that is definitely worth seeing.

FIST is a fictional biopic of a fictional organized labor leader, played by Sylvester Stallone.The movie is split into two, with the first half following the rise of a food-packer named Kovacs (Stallone), to trucking local union organizer in the pre-war midwest, ostensibly Cleveland. The second half follows the growth of the union into a national behemoth in a post-war period of organized crime involvement and congressional investigation.This is a very convincing, beautifully shot period film, from the factories to the clothes to beautiful examples of period vehicles. Stallone's character delivers textbook instruction on how to motivate a crowd, strike, and hardball negotiate.Kovacs grows into middle-age and the compromises he's made earlier with the mob come back to bite him, attracting the attention of an anti-mafia senator, played coolly but fiercely by the great Rod Steiger in a role reminiscent of Robert Kennedy's time as attorney general.FIST is a great film which condenses decades of American history into two hours, and gives a balanced overview of the battle between labor and capital. The first half is totally sympathetic to labor, and makes management look purely evil, but the second half shows the corruption from within of the labor movement, and of any movement that succeeds. It shows how the leaders who scrapped together in the streets eventually are forced to turn on each other. At the start, the enemies are the factory-owners, later the enemies are the associates who were let in the back door. Of course, 30 years later, FIST has a different reference, almost as a period piece when labor had any power whatsoever.FIST was made four years after Godfather II, and 12 years before Goodfellas, which closely share its biopic rise and fall structure.FIST is a great movie in the tradition of classic Hollywood, a huge time-spanning spectacle that is tightly written, shot, and acted. Equally importantly, FIST gets to the core and contradictions of being a worker, a leader, or a boss, and the many conflicts therein.