The Joe Louis Story

This is a biopic of Heavyweight Boxing Champ Joe Louis (Coley Wallace). It starts with his early days training without his mother's consent. It follows his life and his career to his loss to Rocky Marciano.

This is a lower grade B-movie production. The camera work is a little static at times. The technical is not that good. The acting is somewhat limited. Coley Wallace is an actual boxer and a functional sports-actor. This is always a compromise in movies like these. For this one, they are going with the physical and hope for the emotional. I don't mind his acting for the most part, but the director isn't pushing him too hard. They have inserted some real fighting footage. Overall, I am not engaged in this emotionally and that is due to a variety of reasons.

I really enjoyed this film. Coley Wallace does a real good job as Louis. I am glad to see it made it to DVD. Coley Wallace was a terrific boxer himself & the only person ever to beat Rocky Maricano. My only one complaint is the director Robert Gordon, who made some good westerns, rushed this movie a bit, especially the last half. Other than that it's a good movie for boxing history.

If you want to see a movie about Joe Louis, at least up to the point where his career peaks, i recommend that you make a double bill of "The Joe Louis Story" and "Spirit of Youth," the latter STARRING Joe Louis as a young man from a poor family in Alabama who goes on to become the heavyweight champion. That's right -- Joe Louis (and, no actor he, but what does it matter -- it's JOE LOUIS!) made a better *fictional* film about his own life than his memorializers did in this ostensibly non-fiction film. All the insights into Louis' personal life that were missing in the bio-pic -- the Alabama beginnings, the smug over-confidence and breaking of training that led to the loss of the first Schmeling fight, the wife troubles, the emotional reliance on his mother and on his trainer -- all that and more is in "Spirit of Youth" -- PLUS the latter gives us a comic side-kick in the form of none other than the great comedian Mantan Moreland. Yes, "Spirit of Youth" is a fiction, and a light-hearted one for much of the way, and, yes, Joe Louis was not a professional actor in any way, shape, manner, or form, but the fiction in "Spirit of Youth" is in some ways based more closely on fact -- and certainly bears more emotional truth about Joe Louis -- than "The Joe Louis Story" does. Also, it features some great fight scenes with Louis playing the role of a fighter -- that is, staged fights that show him up close and personal the way the old newsreel footage in "The Joe Louis Story" cannot do. My advice is to rent or buy them both (they are both available for a low public-domain price) and watch them back-to-back, "Spiit of Youth" first, followed by "The Joe Louis Story." You'll be glad you did.

The Joe Louis story is told in a long flashback that takes up almost the entire movie by Joe's, Coley Wallace, friend and sports writer Ted McGeeham, Paul Stewart.

The film starts with a young Joe Louis spending his money for violin lessons that his mom Mrs. Barrows, Evelyen Ellis, gave him to sharpen his skills as a professional prize fighter at a local Detroit gym and it doesn't take long for Joe to be recognized as the champ that he eventually become. Hooking up with Jack "Chappie" Blackburn, James Edwards, as his trainer/manager Joe runs up a winning streak that has him knock out two former heavyweight champions Primo Carnera and Max Baer.

Joe looking forward to take on the champ James Braddock has a tune up match with, what everybody thought at the time, washed up heavyweight and also former champ Max Schmeling on June 19, 1936 at New Yorks Yankee Staduim. Schmeling had seen films of Joe's fights and saw that he was a sucker for a right cross, Joe dropped his left hand whenever he threw a jab. Taking advantage of Joe's momentary lapses in the ring Schmeling caught Joe flat-footed with a number of powerful straight rights,over Joe's jabs, and knocked him out in the 12th round; that was the first time Joe Louis ever lost a professional boxing match.

After the Schmeling bout Joe started taking his boxing seriously not taking for granted that he can knock out or defeat anyone that he's in with in the ring. Still Joe was given a chance to fight James Broddock for the heavyweight championship despite being beaten by Max Schmeling, who more then Joe really deserved to fight the Champ, in Chicago on June 22, 1937. Joe being knocked down by Braddock early in the match finished Broddock by flooring him in the eight round winning the heavyweight championship of the world. The stage was now set for the long awaited re-match with Max Schmeling that was to take place exactly a year from when Joe Louis won the championship on June 22, 1938 at Yankee Stadium. This time around it was Schmeling not Joe that got suckered and punched silly, with both rights and lefts, being knocked out by Joe in 2.04 of the first round.

The film skims over most of Joe Louis' 25 defenses of his Heavyweight Championship Crown with him making a comeback in 1950, after he retired from boxing, and getting badly beaten by the then Heavyweight Champ Ezzard Charles in a 15 round decision at Yankee Staduim. Needing money to pay off his some $500,000.00 in back taxes Joe kept on fighting long after he should have hung up his gloves and ended his career on October 26, 1951 at Madison Square Garden. It was then that Joe was matched against the hard hitting 28 year old Brockton MA. slugger Rocky Marciano.

You could see right away that the 218 pound, some 20 pounds over his normal fighting weight, Louis was vastly outmatched with Marciano bulling and manhandling him all around the ring. Joe did catch Rocky with a number of punches, including his lethal left hook and right cross, but they had absolutely no effect on the Brockton Blockbuster. In the eight round Marciano caught Joe with a leaping left hook knocking him down, and almost out, on the seat of his trunks. Taking the eight count Joe tried to survive the round only to get caught on the ropes and knocked out of the ring by a Marciano right that spelled curtains to Joe Louis' 17 year professional boxing career.

Fine performance by Coley Wallace as Joe Louis as well as both James Edwards and John Marly as Joe's trainers Chappie Blackburn and Mannie Seamon. It was Mannie Seamon who took over training Joe after Chappie Blackburn died while Joe was serving overseas in the US Army during WWII. There's also Paul Stewart as sports writer Ted McGeehan who try as he did couldn't get Joe to retire from boxing that lead to him getting his brains scrambled by the likes of Charles and Marciano.

P.S even though it's said that Corley Wallace who played Joe Louis in the movie was the only boxer to defeat Rocky Marciano as an armature, Marciano was never beaten as a professional fighter, the records dispute that. Besides being beaten in a three round decision by Wallace on March 1, 1948 Marciano had lost three times previously as an armature. Marciano lost by a DQ, disquisition, to Ted Lester on April 15, 1946 as well as losing decisions to Joe D'Angelis on August 23, 1946 and Bob Girand on January 17, 1947.

There is not much to recommend about this film. It is a standard issue biopic saddled with inept editing that makes the pace really lag and a screenplay that is nothing but flat undramatic exposition. It is only worth checking out because about 35 minutes are the film are actual Joe Louis fights-including his fight with James J. Bradrock, aka Cinderella Man. Even there the filmmakers decided to try to splice created footage in with the archival material, which doesn't work and distracts from the value of the archival footage. You must be a hardcore boxing or boxing movie fan to get anything from this.