All 7 Anthony Ippolito Movies Before ‘I Play Rocky’, Ranked Worst to Best

Before Anthony Ippolito starts doing the Philly shuffle and screaming “Yo, Adrian” into a New Jersey wind machine, he was the anonymous background noise of two decades’ worth of other people’s movies, a subway extra, a jock, a fourth-grader plotting a murder cover-up. He’s already played Al Pacino in The Offer; now, in Peter Farrelly’s upcoming I Play Rocky, he’s set to play Sylvester Stallone playing Rocky Balboa, dramatizing how the then-unknown actor refused to let anyone else star in the script he wrote. The first Rocky went on to spawn an entire franchise, and launched Stallone as a global star. We can safely say that it is one of the biggest reasons Stallone is Hollywood’s greatest franchise builder.

Every Rocky must first get through a series of bouts on the undercard before going for the title, and the undercard of Ippolito is an odd little series of seven movies stretching out over a period of almost twenty years, most of them blink-and-you’ll-miss-it appearances, which only underscores how far he’s come to land a role as the lead. Before I Play Rocky comes out, here is his entire filmography ranked from worst to best.

7 Pixels (2015)

The nadir of his still-burgeoning career. Anthony Ippolito is credited as the 13-year-old version of Adam Sandler‘s Sam Brenner character in Chris Columbus‘ video-game-invasion comedy. This is a film whose critical drubbing (17% on the Tomatometer, as of July 16, 2026) serves as an industry shorthand for a certain flavor of mid-2010s studio miscalculation. 

It does have a genuinely fun premise (Pac-Man and Donkey Kong as alien weapons). But all the halfway decent ideas get buried under Adam Sandler doing Adam Sandler things, and the script is quite poor too. 

Where to Watch (USA): Netflix, Prime Video (rent)

6 The English Teacher (2013)

Ippolito is credited as “Blowdried Jock” in Craig Zisk’s Tribeca-premiered dramedy. This film had the good sense to cast Julianne Moore, Nathan Lane, and Greg Kinnear and the bad sense to give them a script that mistook cutesy narration for wit. The premise follows an unmarried high school English teacher getting involved with a former star student who became a struggling playwright and decides to stage his play despite her misgivings – Dead Poets Society, but a Hallmark movie version of it, competent enough to watch and forgettable to remember.

Where to Watch (USA): Prime Video, Cineverse

5 Not Fade Away (2012)

David Chase‘s first film after the success of The Sopranos, considered to be one of the greatest television series of all time. It is a coming-of-age story about a group of young men in New Jersey forming a band during the heydays of the so-called British Invasion. At the time of release, it received a mixed reception, with many viewing it as a forgettable and overly long letdown despite moments of genuine emotion. However, some now argue that Chase actually managed to capture the erosion of time and ambition into what looks like a shaggy nostalgia piece. While Anthony Ippolito is lost within the ensemble cast, he has some great company in the form of the late and great James Gandolfini.

Where to Watch (USA): Prime Video (rent), Apple TV (rent)

4 You Have the Right to Remain Violent (2010)

The first legitimate credit in Anthony Ippolito’s career comes in the form of Tyler Whitley in Roberto Monticello’s low-budget thriller involving a secret fight club (harking back to one of David Fincher’s best movies) that the town officials operate behind everyone’s back and which forces minors into violent fights. This is exactly the type of regional independent film that didn’t stand a chance at getting a wide distribution, and doesn’t especially need one. It’s rough and earnest. It’s the first place you can see Ippolito doing actual sustained character work rather than filling a frame.

Where to Watch (USA): Vimeo Pro

3 Fool’s Day (2013)

Cody Blue Snider’s Tribeca-selected short follows a fourth-grade class that accidentally kills its teacher with an April Fool’s prank, then scrambles to cover it up before the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (or D.A.R.E.) officer arrives. It is a pitch-black comedy that manages to tell a lot of story in just a few minutes. It plays like Very Bad Things reimagined by nine-year-olds, directed by the son of Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider (who also appears onscreen as the janitor). Anthony Ippolito’s Seth is a real, sustained part in a genuinely well-regarded piece of short filmmaking, festival pedigree included.

Where to Watch (USA): YouTube

2 Purple Hearts (2022)

This is Anthony Ippolito’s most famous movie role to date, and the one that has brought him face to face with the largest possible audience so far. The Netflix film, a marriage between a politically conservative soldier and a liberal singer-songwriter which, as expected, develops into actual feelings followed the well-established Netflix Original formula: critics found it boring, and audiences loved it. It’s also the clearest evidence, ahead of the Stallone casting, that Ippolito could anchor a studio-adjacent supporting turn in something people actually watched.

Where to Watch (USA): Netflix

1 Bella (2006)

This is by far the best movie in the entire list, where Anthony Ippolito, credited as “Boy on Subway”, a blink-and-miss-him child role at age seven, managed to become just a small part of something that mattered to people. Alejandro Gómez Monteverde’s debut work, it follows the story of a disgraced footballer and a waitress who have an eventful day in New York City. It received the People’s Choice Award at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2006 and the Grand Prize for Best Dramatic Feature at the Heartland Film Festival. The film is sentimental but in a way that earns its sentimentality and not through contrived means.

Where to Watch (USA): Prime Video

Here’s a brief summary of the 7 movies:

No.Title (Year)DirectorMain CastIMDb Score (as of July 16, 2026)Rotten Tomatoes Score (as of July 16, 2026)

7	Pixels (2015)	Chris Columbus	Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Michelle Monaghan, Peter Dinklage, Josh Gad	5.6/10	17% | 46%
6	The English Teacher (2013)	Craig Zisk	Julianne Moore, Michael Angarano, Greg Kinnear, Nathan Lane	5.8/10	46% | 31%
5	Not Fade Away (2012)	David Chase	John Magaro, Jack Huston, Will Brill, Bella Heathcote, James Gandolfini	6.0/10	69% | 42%
4	You Have the Right to Remain Violent (2010)	Roberto Monticello	Anthony Ippolito, Brandon Hannan, James McCaffrey	7.8/10	N/A
3	Fool’s Day (2013, Short)	Cody Blue Snider	Alexander Elling, Kate Braun, Anthony Ippolito, Dee Snider	7.9/10	N/A
2	Purple Hearts (2022)	Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum	Sofia Carson, Nicholas Galitzine, Chosen Jacobs, Anthony Ippolito	6.7/10	32% | 69%
1	Bella (2006)	Alejandro Gómez Monteverde	Eduardo Verástegui, Tammy Blanchard, Manny Perez	7.0/10	45% | 81%

Are you excited to see Anthony Ippolito’s take on Stallone in I Play Rocky? Let us know in the comments.

I Play Rocky will have a limited US theatrical release on November 6, 2026, followed by a wide release on November 20, 2026.