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1947
104 minutes Enterprises
The best boxing picture ever made, this is an allegorical work that covers everything from
the importance of personal honor to corruption in politics. It details the story of a
fighter (John
Garfield) who will do anything to get to the top, and does, with tragic results. As
the champ, Charlie slides into a dissipated lifestyle and throws over his artist
girlfriend, Peg (Lilli Palmer), for a floozy (Hazel Brooks), falling deeper into the
clutches of the gangster who owns him (Lloyd Goff) in the process. Garfield's riveting
Oscar-nominated performance lifts BODY AND SOUL to the masterpiece level, as does Robert
Rossen's superb direction, the marvelous photography of James Wong Howe and the Oscar
winning editing. The fight sequences, in particular, brought a kind of realism to the
genera that had never before existed (Howe wore skates and rolled around the ring shooting
the fight scenes with a hand-held camera). The script was written by Abraham Polonsky who
would go on to write and direct FORCE OF EVIL, a film that had much influence on the work
of Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola. BODY AND SOUL, the fight film to which all
others are compared. |
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