Requiem for a Heavyweight

Requiem for a Heavyweight is a 1962 American film starring Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason and Julie Harris.  Quinn portrays Mountain Rivera, an aging professional boxer who was once ranked number seven in the world.  Gleason is his manager, Maish.

At the beginning of the film, Rivera is knocked out by the real Cassius Clay, who became Muhammad Ali.  As a result, Rivera is medically determined to be unfit for more boxing matches.

He then goes to a governmental employment agency looking for work.  I would have thought Rivera would pursue a young fighter he could coach.

At the agency, Rivera meets Grace (Harris), who is assigned his case.  She takes a interest in him.  Later, Grace tracks him to a bar where Rivera likes to hang out.  She tells him she arranged for him to have an interview with a children's camp for a counseling job.  They also talk about personal subjects.

Such a job runs counter to what plans Maish has for Rivera.  Maish is heavily indebted to a bookie and wants to extricate himself by signing up Rivera to be a professional wrestler.  This is not unprecedented.  The great Joe Louis wrestled after his retirement from boxing.

Maish sabotages the job interview by taking Rivera to a bar and getting him drunk.

Rivera resists transitioning to wrestling as a humiliation.  However, the bookie threatens Maish...so Rivera relents.  Maish also reveals that he had bet against Rivera, but that Rivera owes him...for whatever. 

In 1976, there was another movie about a heavyweight boxer, Rocky.   Rocky's opponent, Apollo Creed, is an act-alike of Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali.  Both Rivera and Rocky lost their fights.  Rocky's love life was a success; Rivera's was a failure.  Both of their apartments were non-descript.  

Paladin, Chapter 14

INT. SHERIFF'S OFFICE - DAY

PALADIN arrives at SHERIFF's office on time.

PALADIN: Morning, Sheriff.  Reporting for duty.

SHERIFF ROGERS: Great!  Raise your right hand and repeat after me.

PALADIN raises his right hand.

SHERIFF ROGERS: I do solemnly swear that I will uphold the laws of the State of Nevada and the Town of Windfall, so help me God.

PALADIN: I do solemnly swear that I will uphold the laws of the State of Nevada and the Town of Windfall, so help me God.

SHERIFF ROGERS: Okay.  You're deputized.  Put on the badge.  I'm gonna get my prisoner. 

PALADIN puts on the badge and waits.  Shortly, the Sheriff reappears with his hand-cuffed prisoner ready for the trip to Reno to stand trial for murder.

SHERIFF ROGERS: See ya in a couple of days, PALADIN.  Good luck.

PALADIN: Thanks.  Good luck to you.

EXT. STREET - DAY

PALADIN, SHERIFF ROGERS and his prisoner exit sheriff's office.  SHERIFF ROGERS and his prisoner mount their horses and head out of town.  PALADIN slowly walks down main street of Windfall.  He enters various stores and business establishments to introduce himself: barber shop, doctor's office, the bank, feed store, land office and the horse stable.  He makes a second visit to the general store.

INT. GENERAL STORE - DAY

PALADIN enters General Store as one female customer leaves.  GRACE is there alone.

PALADIN: Good morning, GRACE.

GRACE: Good morning, PALADIN.

PALADIN: (pointing to his badge) I wanted to let you and your husband know I will be deputy sheriff while SHERIFF ROGERS is away in Reno.  He said he should be back in a couple of days.  If there's anything I can do to help, please let me know.

GRACE: Thank you for your service to Windfall.  I wish you good luck.

PALADIN: Is your husband here?

GRACE: No...and I don't know where he is.  He sometimes leaves without telling me where he's going or when he'll return.  My situation worsens every day.  I blame POLLYANNA.  I believe she lures him away.  I don't know what to do.

PALADIN: Do you want some advice?

GRACE: Yes.  

PALADIN: It takes two.  Maybe she lures, but he catches the bait.  Do you want to keep your husband?

GRACE: Of course.

PALADIN: Then fight for him.  A relationship is not static.  It changes over time.  Both parties have to adapt to the changes or they can drift away from each other.    

GRACE: How can I compete with her?  She's more beautiful, more accomplished, more aggressive.  She's everything I'm not.  All I have with CHARLES is a piece of paper.

PALADIN: Then you have to adapt.  Why do you dress as you do?  Perhaps you need to wear prettier clothes, put on some makeup to get his attention.  If you want to keep him, you must be willing to compete with her.

GRACE: (shaking her head) Just clothes and makeup?  Do you think that's enough?

PALADIN: I don't know what you see when you look in the mirror, but I see an attractive woman in front of me.   

GRACE: You're making fun of me.  Please, don't.

PALADIN: No, I'm not making fun of you.  I'm trying to bring you to appreciate yourself and help you keep your husband.  I'm telling you the truth.  You must believe in yourself.

Tears come to GRACE's eyes.

GRACE: You are a very kind man, PALADIN.  Is there a Mrs. PALADIN?  

PALADIN: Because of the work I chose a long time ago, I could never ask a woman to care for me while I continually risk my life.  

GRACE: Perhaps a woman, the right woman, would be willing to do such a thing, care for you while you continually risk your life.  There are wives of military men and police officers who do such.

PALADIN: You are correct, but I choose otherwise.  As such, I have no wife, never had.  But, I find women, in general, to be very desirable creatures.  Back in San Francisco, I have many...female friends.  I'm not monogamous.  I treat them all with great respect.

GRACE: I'm sure many women love you, PALADIN.  

PALADIN: And I love them, too.

GRACE: You are a very unusual man.  Very admirable.  And very desirable.

PALADIN: Enough about me, GRACE.  Think of what I said.

GRACE: I will.

PALADIN: Well, I should be going.  Please tell your husband I'll be a deputy sheriff for the next couple of days until the SHERIFF returns.  Good day.

GRACE: Come back when you can, PALADIN.  I enjoy your company.

PALADIN leaves the store.

Aunt Frances

 My Aunt Frances was born in the Russian Empire in 1904.  That same year, she was carried by her mother, my grandmother, all the way to the United States, arriving at Ellis Island where they were met by my grandfather who came a year earlier.

They settled in Oswego, New York where they had family.  My mother was born three years later in 1907.

Aunt Frances graduated from Oswego High School.  One of her classmates was Matt Barkley who became my gym teacher at Kingsford Park School.

Aunt Frances graduated from the Oswego Normal School (now the State University of New York at Oswego).  

After graduation, she received two job offers as a teacher: in Amsterdam, New York and on Long Island.  As the former was closer to her family in Oswego, she chose it.  I once asked her if she thought about how her life would have been different had she chosen the latter.  She hadn't.

Aunt Frances stayed on in Amsterdam for most of her life, retiring from her teaching position.  Some of her friends there were the older sisters of the actor, Kirk Douglas (born Izzy Demsky), whom she never met.

Occasionally, during my youth, my parents would drop me off with Aunt Frances in Amsterdam on their way to spend a weekend in New York City.  I was very happy when this happened.  

My aunt was much more easy going than my mother.  Besides, I got to play with her beautiful miniature collie, Ginger.  Also, she introduced to me root beer floats, which I unfortunately don't get to experience at all in Brazil.

Some time after my grandmother died in 1976, Aunt Frances moved to south Florida.  In 1993, an expansion baseball team was created there called the Florida Marlins.  She became a fan, often listening to their games on the radio.

Aunt Frances eventually moved into a senior citizen assisted living facility in Florida where I visited her once.  On our last contact, I called to wish her a happy birthday.  I was impressed by the fact she recognized my voice before I could identify myself.

Aunt Frances died in 2004 at age 100.

    

Lee Remick

Lee Remick, the actress, was born December 14 1935 in Quincy, Massachusetts.  She made her Broadway debut at age 18.

Remick made her film debut in Elia Kazan's A Face in the Crowd (1957).  She portrayed Betty Lou, a teenage baton twirler, who marries the protagonist, played by Andy Griffith.

Remick came to prominence portraying a rape victim whose husband is tried for killing her attacker in Otto Preminger's Anatomy of a Murder (1959).  I consider this to be the best courtroom drama.

When her husband goes to bed early one evening after work, Laura (Remick), feeling bored and lonely, goes to a local bar to drink and play pinball.  Leaving, she is offered a ride by the proprietor who had previously befriended her and her husband.  On their way, he rapes and assaults her.

After arriving home, Laura tells her husband what happened.  He then goes to the bar and kills the rapist.  

Laura has several key scenes both before the trial and during it.  She flirts with her husband's attorney, Paul Biegler (James Stewart), and is intimidated by the prosecutor, Claude Dancer (George C. Scott).

In 1962, Lee Remick stars in the thriller, Experiment in Terror, opposite Glenn Ford.

Also in 1962, Lee Remick stars opposite Jack Lemmon in the romantic drama film Days of Wine and Roses.  They portray a couple who become alcoholics.  

There is a line in the movie that alcoholics often demonstrate obsessive behavior, pointing out that Kirsten's (Remick) previous passion for chocolate may have been the first sign of an addictive personality.  That doesn't apply to me.

Remick was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for the above film, but it was won by Anne Bancroft for The Miracle Worker.  

Remick died of kidney cancer in 1991 at the age of 52.  Que pena!    

 

Behold a Pale Horse

Behold a Pale Horse is a 1964 American drama film directed by Fred Zinnemann and starring Gregory Peck, Omar Sharif and Anthony Quinn.  The story relates to the period in Spain and France twenty years after the Spanish Civil War.

Artiguez (Peck), a member of the defeated Republican forces, lives in exile in France and formerly conducted raids against the Franco government in Spain.  Vinolas (Quinn), a Spanish police officer, desperately wants to capture or kill Artiguez.  

A message is sent to Artiguez to come visit his dying mother in Spain.  It is a trap.  A priest (Sharif) is sent by the mother to tell her son not to come.  Artiguez comes any way.

On Saturday night, September 26, 1964, my brother Paul and I attended a screening of Behold a Pale Horse at a movie theater in Center City Philadelphia.  Just before the movie began, four large men sat down in the row directly in front of us.

Directly in front of me was Dick Modzelewski, a member of the Cleveland Browns football team that would play the hometown Eagles the next day.  Even though I only saw him from the back, I recognized him from his brush hair cut.  I was familiar with Modzelewski from his time with the New York football Giants, my favorite team.

The Browns beat the Eagles that Sunday.  I was in attendance at Franklin Field and saw Modzelewski a second time.  The Browns went on to win the NFL championship that year, 1964, the last time they did so.

I did not know that Modzelewski and I shared the name Blair, my first, his middle.  I also didn't know that he went to the University of Maryland, class of 1953, where my son Bret went, class of 2007.

Modzelewski died in 2018 at the age of 87.

I was reminded of all this when I saw Behold a Pale Horse recently on YouTube for the first time in more than 60 years.   

Paladin, Chapter 13

 INT. HOTEL LOBBY - NIGHT

PALADIN walks across lobby, climbs stairs to door of his room.  Enters his hotel room.  

INT. HOTEL ROOM - NIGHT

As soon as he enters his dark hotel room, he realizes there is another intruder.  He coils up and draws his revolver.  Then he sees it's POLLYANNA sitting on the chair by the window.  She's dressed in attractive clothes.

PALADIN: First your husband, now you sneak into my room.  Didn't anybody teach either of you manners?

POLLYANNA: How come you told my husband we didn't sleep together in San Francisco?

PALADIN: I told him we didn't fuck.  That's such a crude word.  I never do that.  

POLLYANNA: Then, what the hell did we do back there?

PALADIN: That is for you and me to bury in our memories forever...never to discuss again.

POLLYANNA: Oh, yeah?

POLLYANNA starts to undress, first removing her dress, showing her undergarments.

POLLYANNA: You know, my husband is very boring in bed.  He doesn't give a shit whether I'm enjoying myself or not.  As you are aware, some men pride themselves in trying to please their women.

POLLYANNA is now topless, exposing her breasts.

PALADIN: I think you've gone far enough.  It wouldn't look so good if BIG DAN were to show up right now.  Do you know where he is?

POLLYANNA: I don't give a damn where he is.  I want you...now.

PALADIN: Well, you can't have me...now...or ever again.  I don't make love to people who lie.

POLLYANNA: Consider the $1,000 as a payment for such horizontal services.

PALADIN: Not gonna happen.

PALADIN grabs POLLYANNA forcefully and throws her out of his room along with her clothes.  

PALADIN: And don't come back.

POLLYANNA screams.

PALADIN locks door and window to prevent anymore unwelcome visitors.

POLLYANNA: Fuck you, you son of a bitch.

She quickly covers up as a couple of hotel guests arrive on the floor. 

JFK again

Early in September 1960, I was with my family in a Boston hotel lobby when U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy, the Democratic Candidate for President of the United States, walked through it on his way out.  

On October 30, 1963, I was in the upper level of Convention Hall in Philadelphia to hear a speech given by President John F. Kennedy to a group of local members of the Democratic Party at a fund raising dinner.  I remember all the invited guests on the lower level of the Hall wore tuxedos.  The public sat up above and had to provide their own food and drink.

A little before 2 PM on Friday, November 22, 1963 (sixty-two years ago yesterday), I walked into my freshman English class in College Hall at the University of Pennsylvania.  Before the professor arrived to begin the class, one of my fellow students walked in with a transistor radio which was broadcasting the news.  He proclaimed that Kennedy had been shot in Dallas.  I remember my crazy first reaction was “What was he doing in Dallas?”  

We all, now including the professor, sat glued to our seats until we heard the official notification from the radio announcer that the President was dead.  The professor then cancelled class and left.  I returned to my freshman dorm and a weekend all Americans alive at the time will never forget.

The thing I remember most about JFK, besides the Cuban Missle Crisis, was his sense of humor, which was excellent.  He was the first president to have live regularly scheduled news conferences which I occasionally got to watch on TV.  There were 64 of them during his presidency which lasted 1,037 days, an average of one every 16 days.  JFK was glib and, whenever he could, he would elicit some laughter from the assembled journalists, usually of the self-deprecating kind.

As I did not have easy access to a TV, most of my recollections from those tragic days in November of 1963 were from radio and newspapers.  I didn’t see Lee Harvey Oswald, the arrested and accused assassin, shot to death by Jack Ruby in the Dallas police station, live on television.  

We Americans, after having been punched in the stomach, were all in a sort of trance, sleepwalking from moment to moment, incredulous of what had happened to us as a nation.  How would we get past this?  Many of my colleagues didn’t know much about who was the new president (Lyndon Baines Johnson) and few had any confidence in him. 

The thing that sticks most in my mind from that weekend was going to Franklin Field on my college campus to watch the home town Eagles play a football game against the Washington NFL franchise, the two worst teams in its Eastern Conference.  Unlike every other sporting event that weekend, the NFL decided not to cancel its games that Sunday, two days after President Kennedy had been assassinated.  

It was an extremely controversial decision.  As I had previously purchased a ticket and did not want to lose my investment, I along with 60,670 others entered the stadium to witness a meaningless game.  In a gesture to attempt to satisfy their critics, the NFL decided not to telecast any of its games as was normally the case.  Besides, most Americans were too busy watching the continuous news coverage of the assassination.

While I was waiting for the game to begin, I heard some of my fellow football fans in the stadium talk about the assassination of Oswald.  Years later, I would be able to watch a vídeo of this second killing for myself.  Before the game started, someone sang the Star Spangled Banner and virtually the entire assembled mass joined in.  It was a very moving experience.  Oh, by the way, the Eagles lost the game.