Bodyhold (1950)
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The TV-generated popularity of professional wrestling in 1950 inspired a brief cycle of inexpensive films on the subject. Columbia's C-plus Bodyhold borrows the old Kid Galahad formula of a naive young man becoming a wrestler by accident, only to be exploited by crooked promoters. Willard Parker plays a plumber who is forced to subdue a champion grappler. Duplicitous manager Roy Roberts promotes Parker as the successor to the ex-champ, who has been sidelined by a suspicious injury. When Parker refuses to throw a match, Roberts sees to it that Our Hero is incapacitated in the same manner as his predecessor. Thanks to Parker's girlfriend Hillary Brooke, Roberts is caught in the act, and banned from wrestling for life. Of historical interest in Bodyhold is the presence in the cast of real-life wrestlers Henry Kulky, Wee Willie Davis and Ed "Strangler" Lewis. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Complete Cast:
- Willard Parker - Tommy Jones
- Hillary Brooke - Flo Woodbury
- Roy Roberts - Charlie Webster
- Sammy Menacker - Red Roman
- John Dehner - Sir Raphael Brokenridge
- Henry Kulky - Mike Kalumbo
- George Lloyd - Chuck Hadley
- Ray Walker - Professor Weaver
- Ed "Strangler" Lewis - Referee
- Lola Albright - Mary Simmons
- Allen Jenkins - Slats Henry
- Gordon Jones - Pat Simmons
- Frank Sully - Killer Cassidy
- Count Billy Varga - Marvelous Milton
- Wee Willie Davis - Azusa Assassin
- Ruth Warren - Kitty Cassidy
- John Hamilton - Commissioner Harley
- Matt McHugh - Gus Strotz
- Director(s):
- Seymour Friedman
- Writer(s):
- George Bricker
- Producer(s):
- Rudolph C. Flothow
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