Golden Boy 1939

     This film is based on a play written by Clifford Odets.  He was inspired by a story told to him by Paul Muni about how Muni gave up boxing because it endangered his secondary career as a violinist.  The problem between the two professions is that if a boxer injures his hands, he may never play violin again!!  Joe Bonaparte’s father wants him to pursue his musical talent with the violin but Joe wants to be a boxer.  He persuades near-bankrupt manager Tom Moody to give him a chance when Moody's fighter breaks his hand.  Joe’s father gets a new violin for Joe to try to persuade him to stay with the violin and not boxing.  Moody’s girlfriend Lorna Moon visits Joe and she talks him into staying with the fighting business.  Is Lorna thinkng about Joe, herself or Tom Moody??  Tough gangster Eddie Fuseli wants “a piece of Joe” and Lorna starts to have second thoughts??  Does she really have feelings for Joe and can she turn what she’s set in motion around??

     Lorna thinks she has her life under control but does she really?  She is fending for herself but she becomes uncertain about what she is really looking for from life.  She thought she wanted to marry crusty boxing manager Tom Moody?  But, he is already married and he doesn’t have the money for a divorce?  She begins to see-saw between wanting the best for Joe or wanting the best for herself.  Could it be possible they are both the same thing??  What about Moody, what will she tell him if she changes her mind about their relationship??  A drawback and difference between a violin player and a boxer is the people around him.  The mugs, the gamblers, the fashionable set, the race groups, the sadists, the broken-down stumble-bums rolling their heads with the punches?  3 1/2* (I liked this movie)
 
99 min, Drama directed by Rouben Mamoulian and written by Lewis Meltzer, Daniel Taradash, Sarah Y. Mason, Victor Heerman with Barbara Stanwyck, Adolphe Menjou, William Holden, Lee J. Cobb, Joseph Calleia, Sam Levene, Edward Brophy, Beatrice Blinn, William H. Strauss, Don Beddoe.

Note:  Imdb 6.9 out of 10 with 1,646 views, Rotten Tomatoes 46% audience with 373 ratings, Letterboxd 3.2* out of 5*, The Ace Black Blog 5*, Amazon 4.3* out of 5* with 60 ratings.

Special Note:  Filmed on Eighth Avenue and 50th Street, Manhattan, New York City, New York.  William Holden was very grateful to Stanwyck for her insistence on casting him in his first big role.  He sent her flowers every year on the anniversary of the first day of filming.  Holden publicly thanked Stanwyck at the 1978 Academy Awards.  She was his co-presenter and she shed a few tears.  Holden took boxing and violin lessons all day every day for a week before production began.  Then he boxed two hours a day and practiced the violin for 1 1/2 hours each night to keep his fingering convincing.  Lee J. Cobb is playing William Holden’s middle-aged father but he was actually only 27!!  Almost 5000 actors were considered for the part of Joe Bonaparte and more than 80 were given screen tests.  The odds were very much against William Holden but director Rouben Mamoulian also lobbied for Holden.  Many consider 1939 to be the greatest year in the history of movies.