BEFORE: One day with the new chain, and already I'm messing with it. I was going to watch this boxing in about two weeks, after karate and wrestling films, but then two things changed my mind - first, "Pat and Mike" featured Spencer Tracy as a boxing manager, and another character who was a boxer (and I'd thought it was just a movie about golf and tennis). Plus, seeing Spencer Tracy, along with Jim "Mr. Howell" Backus, made me think about one of my all-time fave films, "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World", which starred both of those men, along with Mickey Rooney, who's featured in this film (and somehow, improbably, making his first appearance in this project).
It also gives me an opportunity to give a shout out to the late Ray Bradbury - this film was written by Rod Serling, host/creator of "The Twilight Zone", and some of Bradbury's best adapted work appeared on that show. I realize it's a tenuous connection, but it's timely - though I'm planning a chain of Mars-themed films in about three months, and considering Bradbury's famous work "The Martian Chronicles", perhaps that would be a more fitting tribute.
THE PLOT: "Mountain" Rivera, a once-promising but now washed-up boxer faces the end of his career after he is savagely defeated by a younger boxer.
AFTER: The original version of this story appeared in half-hour form on the TV show "Playhouse 90", with Jack Palance in the lead role. Rod Serling then wanted to adapt it into a Broadway play, but then was convinced it would work better in a longer film version. And it mostly does, but some problems are to be expected when a tight half-hour teleplay gets stretched out to a 90-minute feature. You can call them dramatic pauses, or time-killers, depending on your point of view. A couple of conversations between the manager and the cut-man (like the card-playing scene) had a tendency to go around in circles.
But the portrait of the aging, punch-drunk boxer carries more weight - what people used to call "punch-drunk" is now referred to as "brain-damaged", just as the war-related affliction "shell shock" has been re-termed as "post-traumatic stress disorder". Rivera has slurred speech (though that may just be Anthony Quinn's accent), damage to his eye, and he starts throwing punches whenever he hears a bell ring - trust me, you don't want to be standing next to this guy in a building lobby when the elevator arrives.
After the doctor declares him unfit to fight, he's got a pipe dream of working with kids at an athletic camp. Because it's always a good idea to allow people who aren't right in the head to work with kids. More troubles abound as Rivera's manager seems to be acting squirrelly and hiding from some shady characters - Rivera says he's never taken a dive, but you start to get the feeling that maybe he was supposed to, and forgot. Or maybe his manager never clued him in on the deal. When you see a fat guy running like that, you know he's got to be in trouble.
I was reminded of the story about Jackie Gleason making a bet with famed restaurateur Toots Shor - after a long night of drinking (presumably), Gleason bet Shor $1,000 that he could run around the block faster. They started out in different directions, and Toots huffed and puffed around the block to find Gleason waiting for him. Yet he hadn't passed him at any point along the way - it turned out that Gleason had turned the corner and hailed a cab.
I kind of wish there had been more boxing in this boxing movie. The opening fight is shot from Rivera's point of view, as he's getting beat up pretty good, which means we never get to see him throw a punch. Whether this was done as a stylistic choice or as a cost-cutting measure is a debatable point. And then after that, it's mostly talky-talky as people discuss Rivera's status and he decides how he's going to spend his days after boxing.
I found it a little stereotypical - boxing's got a reputation for being shady, so after watching quite a few boxing films, it might be more ground-breaking to see an honest manager featured on film. Maybe that's just me, though...
I'd hoped that by now some channel would have aired "The Fighter", and also "Rocky Balboa" so I can complete the boxing topic. But, the movie programming gods have not cooperated, so I will have to revisit the subject at least one more time. On to the next sport.
Starring Anthony Quinn (last seen in "The Guns of Navarone"), Jackie Gleason (last seen in "Smokey and the Bandit II"), Julie Harris, with cameos from Jack Dempsey and Cassius Clay (aka Muhammad Ali).
RATING: 4 out of 10 uppercuts
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