Boxing Films Trivia Quiz

Answer: Buster Keaton

A pampered rich man's son is sent to the mountains to 'be a man'. There he meets a beautiful girl that he falls in love with. Her father is reluctant until he mistakes him for the boxer with the same name. He must then fight to get his girl.

Keaton is one of the giants of silent screen comedies.

Answer: Jackie Cooper

King Vidor directed the film which also had a nomination for Best Picture. The film proved a transition for Beery into similar roles and established hims as a strong character actor. Cooper was able to parley this early success into a long film and television career. At age nine he was the youngest to be nominated for a supporting actor award for "The Champ". Cooper's 1982 auto- biography was called "Please Don't Shoot My Dog" based on a scene in "Skippy" in which a director threatened to do just that if he did not cry in a scene. Later Cooper was to do two television series and played Perry White, Clark Kent's editor, in the "Superman" series.

In 1979 "The Champ" was remade starring Jon Voight and Ricky Schroder.

Answer: Golden Boy

"Golden Boy" concerns a young man who must choose to be a boxer or a violinist. Barbara Stanwyck plays the society girl who tries to dissuade him from pugilism.

Holden won an Oscar for "Stalag 17" in 1953 and received nominations for best actor for "Sunset Boulevard" (1951) and "Network" (1957). Other fine performances were in "Picnic" ((1955), "The Moon Is Blue" (1953), "Born Yesterday" (1952), and "Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957).

In 1964 Sammy Davis Jr. revived "Golden Boy' as a musical on Broadway and received a Tony nomination.

Answer: Body and Soul

John Garfield got an Academy Award nomination for "Body and Soul". It won the Award for film editing and was nominated for screenplay. "Body and Soul" was regarded as the most realistic fight film at that time. James Wong Howe, the cinematographer, wore roller skates and used a hand-held camera to catch close-up action.

Garfield was probably the most tragic victim of the Hollywood Blacklist of the 1950s. He never worked in films again and his death at thirty-nine was at least partially because of the blacklist.

Answer: Champion

Kirk Douglas' performance as the amoral Midge Kelly is the one that grabbed the public's attention and catapulted Douglas to star billing. The film is based on a Ring Lardner short story and is driven by a Dimitri Tiomkin score. The film garnered nine Oscar nominations but won only for Film Editing. Douglas had his first acting nomination and Arthur Kennedy, who played the brother and conscience of Douglas, was given an Oscar nod for supporting actor.

Answer: The Harder They Fall

The screenplay was based on the Budd Schulberg novel of the same name. It is loosely based the Primo Carnera/Max Baer fight of 1934 in which Baer laughed and joked as he sent the supposedly unstoppable Carnera to the canvas ten times until the fight was stopped. Rod Steiger plays the ruthless promoter responsible for the fixed fights and the final championship bout where he bets on his own fighter to lose. Max Baer was hired to play Buddy Brannen who defeats Moreno in the climactic fight.

Answer: Paul Newman

Graziano is most remembered for his three fights with Tony Zale. He was later suspended from boxing because of alleged bribery attempts. He made television a second career appearing on a number of shows but best remembered as Martha Raye's 'gumba'. He opened a popular pizza restaurant in New York City,

The film won two Academy Awards for Cinematography and Art Decoration. Newman was able to win better roles on the basis of this film. There were several familiar names that appeared in the film but were uncredited including Robert Duvall, Jinx Falkenburg, Dean Jones, Robert Loggia, and Steve McQueen. Court Shepard played Tony Zale uncredited and also appeared in twenty-seven other films, also mostly uncredited.

Answer: Burgess Meredith

Meredith received an Oscar nomination as did Stallone, Young, and Talia Shire. Made for just over a million dollars, the movie grossed three hundred and fifty million worldwide.

A neighborhood thug and club fighter is given the unlikely chance to box for the world championship due to magnanimous gesture by Apollo Creed, the champ. Although he loses the bloody bout, he goes from rags to riches as his loss is really a triumph for the spirit.

Answer: Jake La Motta

Robert De Niro was so impressed with the rambling Jake La Motta autobiography that he enlisted Martin Scorsese to help develop it. Two screenwriters produced a script that neither De Niro nor Scorcese liked so they essentially re-wrote the screenplay, although they were not credited. Scorsese wanted his film to be unique so he tried to film it from the boxer's point of view rather than the traditional spectator view.

At the Academy Awards the film had eight nominations winning with Best Actor (De Niro) and Film Editing. "Raging Bull" is always high on the list of all time great films. Putting aside the bloody choreographed boxing sequences, the film delves into La Motta's rage, sexuality, and excesses by which he destroys his relationships with his wives, family, and friends.

Vikki La Motta, who Jake married at sixteen, became a minor celebrity, posing nude for playboy in 1981 at age fifty-one.

Answer: Million Dollar Baby

"Million Dollar Baby" (2004) was the darling of the 2004 Academy Awards winning Best Picture, Best Actress (Hillary Swank), Best Director (Clint Eastwood), and Best Supporting Actor (Morgan Freeman). In addition Eastwood was nominated for Best Actor and technical awards for Film Editing and Screenplay. It was a tour de force for Eastwood as he produced and composed the musical score.

A young waitress shows potential for boxing. She shoots to the top of her profession. The film not only deals with boxing as a sport but relates to moral and ethical issues which made it difficult for reviewers, as to define the issue was to be a plot spoiler.