The Champ ** (1979, Jon Voight, Faye Dunaway, Ricky Schroder) – Classic Movie Review 8639

Director Franco Zeffirelli’s 1979 love-triangle boxing movie tearjerker The Champ is a soggy remake of the 1931 Wallace Beery-Jackie Cooper weepie The Champ, hopelessly out of its time five decades later, with Jon Voight out of place as the thick prizefighter Billy Flynn and Faye Dunaway ill at ease as a loving mum, his ex-wife, Annie, who comes back after abandoning their young son TJ seven years earlier.

Talented tot Ricky Schroder (promoted to Little Lord Fauntleroy in 1980), though, is entirely at home among the stars. A sentimentally-inclined Zeffirelli, here in a particularly slushy mood, tries all he knows to wring the tears.

It was nominated for one Oscar: Best Original Score (Dave Grusin). Ricky Schroder won a Golden Globe as New Star of the Year in a Motion Picture – Male and Voight was nominated Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama. On the other hand, Schroder won Worst Supporting Actor at The Stinkers Bad Movie Awards 1979.

Also in the cast are Jack Warden, Arthur Hill, Strother Martin, Joan Blondell, Elisha Cook Jr, Mary Jo Catlett, Stefan Gierasch, Allan Miller, Joe Tornatore, Shirlee Kong, Jeff Blum and Dana Elcar.

The Champ is directed by Franco Zeffirelli, runs 121 minutes, is made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), is released by MGM-UA, is written by Walter Newman, based on the story by Frances Marion, is shot by Fred J Koenekamp, is produced by Dyson Lovell, is scored by Dave Grusin and is designed by Herman A Blumenthal.

The Champ has been used in experiments to see if depressed people are more likely to cry than non-depressed people.

Franco Zeffirelli (1923–2019).

RIP Franco Zeffirelli, born on 12 February 1923 in Florence, and died in Rome on 15 June 2019, aged 96.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8639

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Talented tot Ricky Schroder stars in The Champ.