Why American audiences screamed at the scene of drinking raw eggs in the movie ‘Rocky’ | News & Analysis | Diamond Online

The photo is an image Photo: PIXTA

TKG, simmering omelet
Unique to Japan?

The movie “Rocky” is Sylvester Stallone’s breakout work, produced in 1976 (Showa 51). Rocky decides to fight the world heavyweight champion to give an unknown boxer a chance to achieve the American Dream.

There is a scene where Rocky wakes up at 4:00 in the morning and breaks five raw eggs into a vertically long cup and drinks them all at once.

From a Japanese point of view, you would think that he had the guts to eat a raw egg without using chopsticks and without pouring soy sauce on it, and that he was really fired up for the game.

However, when the movie was released in the United States, I heard that when this scene came up, the audience screamed, booed, and even sobbed.

Outside of Japan, there is a danger of food poisoning from salmonella bacteria on raw eggs. Considering such “common sense”, Rocky was poor and had no choice but to risk his life to drink raw eggs. It seems that this was a production to show the viewers a tough guy boxer who challenges the fight knowing the danger.

However, it seems that American audiences were more strongly struck by the life-threatening issues. In fact, Stallone didn’t want to do this shoot, so he won a special bonus.

As an aside, 1976 marked the 200th anniversary of the founding of the United States, and Philadelphia, the stage of the film, is meaningful as the “birthplace of America” where the Declaration of Independence was made. Also impressive is the scene of running on roadwork and catching fruits (both orange and apple theories) thrown by the old man at the market. It is said that it was a B-grade movie with no budget and a small crew was mistaken for a filming of a real boxer. This was the product of chance, produced by Stallone, an unknown actor who was still unknown at the time. After that, this movie was a big hit (winning Academy Awards for Best Picture, Director, Editing, etc.), and it was Stallone who won the American Dream. And this August, Stallone rebuilt his series’ biggest hit “Rocky 4” and released “Rocky VS Drago ROCKY IV”. With 42 minutes of never-before-seen footage, Stallone spent a long time reworking it to his ideal.

Now, let’s go back to the theme of this time, raw eggs. The difference between “egg” and “egg” is that raw before heating is “egg” (e.g. raw egg, egg over rice), and heated and cooked is “egg” (e.g. tamagoyaki, atsuyaki tamago) It is common to However, there are exceptions such as “tamagoyaki” and “boiled egg”, which is confusing.

In Japan, the hygiene management of eggs is thorough, and the term TKG (Tamago kake gohan: an acronym for egg, kake, and rice) has become well-established, and many specialty stores have opened.

The word “TKG” is said to have originated from the 2007 cookbook “365 Nichi Tamagokake Gohan no Hon” (TKG Project, Yomiuri Rengo Advertisement).

The toro-toro omelet is another Japanese favorite. When I was having a breakfast meeting (a business meeting while having breakfast) with a foreigner from overseas at a certain foreign-affiliated hotel in Japan. At that hotel, there was a service where the cook would make an omelet for each order at breakfast in front of you.

At that time, I came across a scene where a foreigner was complaining to the cook. Apparently, he didn’t like the melty omelet I ordered, so he asked me to make it harder. Food that is taken for granted in Japan may not be so for foreigners.