Palooka

Hilarious pre censorship code boxing farce with Jummy Durante and Stuart Erwin, this homespun Vs city comedy about fixed boxing matches pre dates the Robert Wise classic by 15 years. It's an altogether different tone but with a similar theme: set-up boxing bouts. This one is played for laughs and sappy romance.....the attraction here definitely being the very rude and outright vulgarity of the comedy. Durante is flapping about snozzling his ridiculous comedy style with double meaning retorts and, glamorpuss bra-less nightclub floozie Lupe Velez whilst clearly not wearing underwear beneath her silk gowns has a neckline plunge so low it's a wonder viewers didn't see the map of Tasmania, so to speak. One outright hilarious scene with a French waiter saying "Oui Oui" repeatedly gets yelled at by an exasperated Durante who says "Alfonse! Will you stop wee weeing all over the place". Durante's theme song "Inka Dinka Doo" was obviously a gramophone hit in this era and gets a show spot all to itself. The laughter of Depression viewers in giant old theaters would have lifted the roof on many occasions in this one hour sparring match of one-liners. Everyone gets walloped, even Mother belts Hubby's showgirl pick-up square on the jaw in reel one. Stuart Erwin plays his usual "aww gee" hick character, and James Cagney's lookalike brother (astonishingly so) William, plays Mc Swatt the bad dude boxer also chasing Lupe's hemline. It's a very funny film. The DVD disc available in shops in Oz is OK, more like a DVD rom with some grainy pixilation. Made by Reliance Pictures, who sound like Majestic or Liberty or Chesterfield Pictures, all poverty row outfits of the time, I have a suspicion it is again, a faux Tiffany Production: they folded in 1932 but clearly kept the lot running as various other "name" brands used the facilities. The production values of PALOOKA a very good with the style of decor and design of a Tiffany Production.

This feature length film based on Ham Fisher's comic strip Joe Palooka has Stu Erwin cast as quite a different Palooka than Fisher created. In the strip Joe Palooka is a clean living Jack Armstrong/Frank Merriwell type, defender of the weak and downtrodden when he's not in the ring. Erwin is clean living all right but no one would ever cast him as a Jack Armstrong.

Stu is the son of an Armstrong though, Robert Armstrong plays Pete Palooka his dad, former champion who could not lay off the booze and the women. That caused a split with his wife show girl Marjorie Rambeau and she quit the stage and raised Erwin out in the country on a farm with lots of clean living and a wholesome girl played by Mary Carlisle wants to marry him.

But a chance encounter with fight manager Knobby Walsh played by the one and only Jimmy Durante has Erwin convinced to follow his dad into the boxing game. And another fluke has him beating champion William Cagney and not only inheriting his title but also his girlfriend Lupe Velez.

Now that's one cast of colorful players that should alone make you want to see this film. Even if it's not what creator Ham Fisher had in mind Palooka is still a nice film with a few sly innuendos that those who love those before the Code films will appreciate.

Written into the film is Jimmy Durante in a drunken stupor singing one of his famous songs Inka-Dinka-Doo. And there's nothing like the come hither glance that only Lupe Velez can give to any man. That woman could seduce Truman Capote.

Not a great one as far as boxing films are concerned but still some fine entertainment.

Wow. PALOOKA might have just about every boxing cliché known to films, yet somehow it manages to be very likable and a great film for lovers of old B-movies. Much of this is because the dialog hums and the stars do the most with the material.

Stu Erwin plays Joe Palooka--a farm boy who is discovered by a boxing promoter (Jimmy Durante) and becomes a nation-wide sensation. Erwin is good as a country boy though he is an odd choice to play the title character. In the comic, Joe was a heavyweight boxer but Erwin is pretty scrawny--and far from physically imposing. Despite the odd casting, Erwin is pretty good. Plus, able supporting characters help his performance quite a bit.

I am surprised to admit this, but probably the best actor in the film was Jimmy Durante. In the past I have been HIGHLY critical of some of his films, though the fault wasn't entirely Durante's. MGM foolishly paired him with Buster Keaton in sound films--even though Keaton's style was the polar opposite of Durante's. Keaton was a silent comic and Durante was brash and loud--very, very loud! Here, however, his insanely loud and dynamic persona actually works--much like it did in Hollywood PARTY. I liked how he constantly poked fun at himself and the ending with him and his new wife was wonderful--you just have to see it to believe it.

As for the plot, there are so many familiar plot elements--the bad woman who turns Joe's attention away from his virtuous girlfriend and boxing, the mother who is determined that her son won't throw his life away in the ring, the estranged father, etc., etc., etc.. Yet, despite all this it is also highly entertaining and fun throughout. A very good B film that is more enjoyable and fun than its score of 6 would usually indicate.

I got a kick out of this film for the first half of it, but it got so stupid with the main characters that I had a hard time finishing it. However, it was still worth a look to see Lupe Valez. I had read what a strange character she was in real life, and that she was sexy woman, so at least I have now seen her. She was a very pretty lady and not shy, either. This film just made it under the wire before the Hays Code came along, so Lupe showed us about all of her breasts. They weren't anything noteworthy, but she certainly showed what she had and a year later, she would have been forced to cover up.

Stu Erwin plays the boxer "Joe Palooka." He plays a really inept fighter and stupid guy in general who is endearing for awhile but wears thin. The same goes for Jimmy Durante's role of fight manager "Knobby Walsh." He really wears thin.

Anyway, this is typical early '30s material which means very corny and dated in the humor and romance department, sometimes hilarious and a bit racy and edgy but one that bogs down midway through.

You'll know the ancient Greek myth of the Sirens: beautiful woman-like creatures who were so utterly alluring they would lure sailors onto the rocks to die. The spirit of those temptresses lived on in the equally alluring shape of Lupe Vélez. SO HEED MY WARNING: just because you have heard that Lupe Vélez wears the lowest cut, gravity-defying, sexiest dress ever created (clearly by some powerful dark magic), be like Odysseus and ignore the temptation. If you don't you'll be sorry because the last thing you want to do is suffer an hour and a half of this!

You often hear the word Palooka in pictures from the 30s and 40s which I'd always though was just one of those many slang insults which were thrown around - seemingly not! It comes from this film - or rather from a massively popular American newspaper comic strip called 'Joe Palooka' on which this film was based. A PALOOKA is a not very bright, sometimes violent but not malevolent thug. 'Moose' played by Mike Mazurki in FAREWELL MY SWEET is probably the perfect example. As much as the etymology is quite interesting, the film is not. It's probably because the characters are taken from a comic strip that they're one dimensional. Maybe back when people were reading "The Funnies" they'd enjoy seeing these drawings come to life but for us now this feels flat and lifeless.

It starts off promising enough with a great cast: you'll recognise Otis Harlan (Happy from SNOW WHITE), Robert Armstrong, Thelma Todd and the wonderful Marjorie Rambeau..... but that's all in flashback. After ten minutes the story starts properly and we end up with the B team taking over. From then on the whole thing rapidly goes downhill. After an hour you'll be hating yourself for deciding to watch this.

Even though his character is based on a comic strip drawing Stuart Erwin is terrible, absolutely terrible, absolutely horrendously terrible in this. His character, like the one he played in MAKE ME A STAR is, as they might have said back in the 30s 'feeble minded.' His character's flaws and issues were intrinsic to the story of MAKE ME A STAR, they made you sympathise with him, he came across as a real person and you were desperate to be able to do something to help him. In this you feel you'd want to lock him up in the attic. He's lazily written, appallingly acted and doesn't seem to be directed at all. He is an idiot so ridiculous that he lacks any credibility or authenticity and since you can't believe he's real, you can't like him, you don't care about him and you certainly don't find him funny.

Even worse is Jimmy Durante. It seems he was around forever but I have never seen him ever before. I'm no spring chicken but I've never heard of this person until now - how lucky I am!. Just watch some of this and you'll understand why nobody today knows who Jimmy Durante is. Heavens to Murgatroyd, as Snagglepuss used to exclaim, he's unbelievably awful!

That the only thing worth watching in this tiresome picture, beside seeing why James Cagney's brother's acting career never went anywhere, is an attractive young Mexican lady who couldn't act very well in a sexy outfit clearly shows what rubbish this is. She is quite pretty but nothing is worth the payment of an hour and a half of Jimmy Durante. As a more palatable alternative, she did look rather breath-taking in THE HALF NAKED TRUTH but you would have to put up with an hour and a half of Lee Tracy - nothing like as bad as Mr Durante.