If any of you guys have Turner Classic Movies they're showing a lot of Classic Boxing movies tonight.
Starting at 8 PM Eastern time tonight on through the wee hours of the morning.
Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962)
Fat City (1972)
Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956)
Golden Boy (1939)
The Harder They Fall (1956)
Boxing Movie Marathon tonight (December 4) on TCM
Re: Boxing Movie Marathon tonight (December 4) on TCM
I've never seen 3 of these so I'm excited to see those. Requiem for a Heavyweight and Somebody Up There Likes Me I can confirm are really great. I've always heard good things about Fat City too, and Bogey's in 'The Harder they Fall' so I'm excited to see those as well.
Re: Boxing Movie Marathon tonight (December 4) on TCM
They're interesting movies, but what I don't like about most boxing movies is: Requiem depicts a veteran Heavyweight who's clueless.. He's like an overgrown kid who doesn't know what going on with his trainer and manager who're ripping him off and mismatching him – betting against him. He’s dumbfounded by everything like he's 10 years old.
The Harder they Fall makes it seem like Boxing is fixed. They have this big Carnera like character who's really dumb and has no idea all his fights were fixed and he doesn't actually have any skills.. His old trainer (Jersey Joe Walcott) clues him in by easily out-boxing the naive idiot..
Even Paul Newman does a caricature of a boxer – acting as dumb and slow as can be.. Graziano was a lot sharper than that.
Robert De Niro as well in Raging Bull.. LaMotta had more between the ears than that.. Can a successful, intelligent boxer be portrayed?
The Harder they Fall makes it seem like Boxing is fixed. They have this big Carnera like character who's really dumb and has no idea all his fights were fixed and he doesn't actually have any skills.. His old trainer (Jersey Joe Walcott) clues him in by easily out-boxing the naive idiot..
Even Paul Newman does a caricature of a boxer – acting as dumb and slow as can be.. Graziano was a lot sharper than that.
Robert De Niro as well in Raging Bull.. LaMotta had more between the ears than that.. Can a successful, intelligent boxer be portrayed?
Re: Boxing Movie Marathon tonight (December 4) on TCM
Does Ali count?
Maybe one day they'll make a movie about The Klitschko's or Lennox Lewis.
As far as Fictional boxers being smart, though it's not a Boxing movie in the traditional sense Brad Pitt's pikey character for all his garbled language has the smarts to ambush the Crime Boss at the end, and get the upper hand on him, so that kinda counts maybe.
Maybe one day they'll make a movie about The Klitschko's or Lennox Lewis.
As far as Fictional boxers being smart, though it's not a Boxing movie in the traditional sense Brad Pitt's pikey character for all his garbled language has the smarts to ambush the Crime Boss at the end, and get the upper hand on him, so that kinda counts maybe.
Re: Boxing Movie Marathon tonight (December 4) on TCM
Out of the 3 I've seen, Harder They Fall is the best of those. Bogey's last screen appearance before his death the following year. A consummate professional, to say the least - filmed while he battled cancer.
Quinn is good in Requiem but the screenplay isn't the greatest. I didn't really like Somebody Up There Likes Me.
I'll check out Golden Boy, though not a huge Holden fan. Doubt I can get into Fat City. 70s just isn't my era outside of the Godfather and a handful of others.
Quinn is good in Requiem but the screenplay isn't the greatest. I didn't really like Somebody Up There Likes Me.
I'll check out Golden Boy, though not a huge Holden fan. Doubt I can get into Fat City. 70s just isn't my era outside of the Godfather and a handful of others.