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Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Sadly Over-hyped

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

PALOOKA (United Artists, 1934), an Edward Small Production for Reliance Pictures, directed by Benjamin Stoloff, is a boxing comedy based on then popular comic strip character by the name of "Joe Palooka," as created by Ham Fischer. Starring Jimmy Durante in his first leading role, the title character goes to the third billed Stuart Erwin, a yokel farm boy who develops himself into a prizefighter like his once famous father.The under five minute prologue opens in the horse and buggy/gas-lit "Shine On, Harvest Moon" 1890s era of New York City's Broadway district that presents Joe Palooka as the infant son of famous boxer, Pete Palooka (Robert Armstrong), notable for his corkscrew punch. Pete enters the backstage entrance of the theater to meet with his wife, Mayme (Marjorie Rambeau), in her dressing room to get a good luck kiss from her for the upcoming fight. After winning the boxing title, Pete has a victory party, forgetting his promise to spend it with Mayme. Mayme, however, enters the celebration where she catches her womanizing husband with Trixie (Thelma Todd), which thus ends their relationship in marriage. Twenty years later, Mayme, a retired entertainer country living on a farm in Brookfield, New York, has done well raising her son, Joe (Stuart Erwin), now a young yokel helping with the farm chores. While driving down the road to deliver eggs to the train station for his mother, Joe witnesses an incident on the side of the road involving a prizefighter, "Dynamite" Wilson (Al Hill) socking Knobby Walsh (Jimmy Durante) for money owed him. In Knobby's defense, Joe knocks out Dynamite in one punch, thus, having Knobby talking Joe into becoming his prizefight manager once he learns of Joe being the son of the grand champ in his day. Because Mayme wants nothing to do with fighters and her association with husband, Pete, Joe tells his mother about acquiring a big city job working for Knobby in "the leather business," while his best girl, Anne Howe (Mary Carlisle), knows and keeps his secret. Mayme, however, learns the truth while listening to a sports radio program and hopes her son "gets his block knocked off." Although Joe is not a natural fighter as his father, he does have a stroke of luck fighting with Al McSwatt (William Cagney, James Cagney's look-alike brother), who arrives drunk at City Stadium in Paterson, N.J., unable to function at his best. Now that Joe is phony champion through a series of fixed fights arranged by Knobby, Nina Madero (Lupe Velez), a cabaret entertainer, changes her affections from McSwatt to Joe, changing the country boy yokel to an over-confident, obnoxious leather-pusher, no longer the good boy his mother had raised nor the prizefighter Knobby had earlier discovered. If that's not enough, McSwatt wants to have a rematch fight against Joe Palooka to win back Mona's false love and affections.Other members of the cast include: Franklin Ardell ("Doc' Wise, McSwatt's Manager); Tom Dugan ("Whitey," Joe's trainer); Louise Beavers (Crystal, the Palooka Maid); Frederick "Snowflake" Toones ("Smokey"); Stanley Fields ("Blackie"); Gus Arnheim and his Orchestra; and Rolfe Sedan (Alphonse, the Dressmaker). Look quickly for Guinn Williams ("Slats") in one brief scene at the start of the movie. Though there are several songs credited for PALOOKA, only "Would You Like Me a Little Bit More?" (sung by Lupe Velez in the Paradise Club sequence); and Jimmy Durante's signature song, "Inka-Dinka Do" are performed.Aside from watching early Jimmy Durante with full head of dark hair with his familiar (sometimes forced) mannerisms to get his quota of laughs, and the casting of Stuart Erwin in the title role, there's that Mexican Spitfire Lupe Velez arousing much attention as the flirtatious Mona, who is called a "tramp" by Joe's mother. Robert Armstrong, better known for his leading role in KING KONG (RKO Radio, 1933), makes a satisfactory former boxing champion hoping to win back both wife and son in the latter portion of the story. Marjorie Rambeau, (in a performance that makes one think of actress, Gladys George) essays both younger and later middle-aged portrayal as a tough gal with conviction, even down to packing a wallop as good as her boxer husband.Initially theatrically released at 86 minutes, PALOOKA was later reissued with Astor Picture distribution in edited form of 74 minutes along with elimination of Thelma Todd's (1906-1935) name from the opening cast credits. The reissues have been those that were made available to television for many years.) PALOOKA also became a 45 minute featurette on public television's "Matinee at the Bijou" in the early 1980s). It was also in the early 1980s that PALOOKA, now a public domain movie title, was distributed to video cassette (and later DVD) by various distributors. Only the Hal Roach Company was the only distributer to release the film to home video in complete 86 minute edition. In later years, American Movie Classics cable channel broadcast the complete/unedited PALOOKA during the 1999/2000 season.Although Joe Palooka and Knobby Walsh were later portrayed a decade later by Joe Kirkwood Jr. and Leon Errol in a second feature film series for Monogram Studios (1946-1951), it's the Jimmy Durante and Stuart Erwin combination that's better known for being amusingly good to the last punch. Inka Dinka Do. (**1/2 boxing gloves)

Wow. PALOOKA might have just about every boxing cliché known to films, yet somehow it manages to be very likable and a great film for lovers of old B-movies. Much of this is because the dialog hums and the stars do the most with the material.Stu Erwin plays Joe Palooka--a farm boy who is discovered by a boxing promoter (Jimmy Durante) and becomes a nation-wide sensation. Erwin is good as a country boy though he is an odd choice to play the title character. In the comic, Joe was a heavyweight boxer but Erwin is pretty scrawny--and far from physically imposing. Despite the odd casting, Erwin is pretty good. Plus, able supporting characters help his performance quite a bit.I am surprised to admit this, but probably the best actor in the film was Jimmy Durante. In the past I have been HIGHLY critical of some of his films, though the fault wasn't entirely Durante's. MGM foolishly paired him with Buster Keaton in sound films--even though Keaton's style was the polar opposite of Durante's. Keaton was a silent comic and Durante was brash and loud--very, very loud! Here, however, his insanely loud and dynamic persona actually works--much like it did in Hollywood PARTY. I liked how he constantly poked fun at himself and the ending with him and his new wife was wonderful--you just have to see it to believe it.As for the plot, there are so many familiar plot elements--the bad woman who turns Joe's attention away from his virtuous girlfriend and boxing, the mother who is determined that her son won't throw his life away in the ring, the estranged father, etc., etc., etc.. Yet, despite all this it is also highly entertaining and fun throughout. A very good B film that is more enjoyable and fun than its score of 6 would usually indicate.

Surprisingly spry given that this film is a premise to film antiquity. I always knew who Jimmy Durante was as a late boomer, but I had never seen him in his prime until this movie. I'm glad I did. He doesn't pretend to be an actor and delivers his lines with a uniform delivery. He's not a very funny man, but a weird oddity as an entertainer, the likes of whom would never ever be taken seriously in today's world of commodified entertainers. What's another point of interest in this film is the appearance of a William Cagney,brother of James....I assume the older of the two. Cagney's first scene when he shows up to his fight pie-eyed is a rather realistic and understated portrayal of drunkenness. There is plenty of drinking in this movie and many people get drunk. What's also an unexpectedly nice touch to this film is that the RELATIONSHIPS ARE BELIEVABLE. Filial conflict peppers this film in that the protagonist has to wrestle with his divided loyalty as cornered by his mother and father. Sometimes the film veers off into unbelievable ridicularity that could never respect the viewer; like when Durante wobbles drunkenly down the street, smashes a showcase window, then enters the display and starts his riinka-dinnk routine on the display's piano The least acquired appreciation for the film is its presence of Runyan-esquire toughs. These actors are CHARACTERS, not celebrities acting in obvious vehicles. Worth a look.

Hilarious pre censorship code boxing farce with Jummy Durante and Stuart Erwin, this homespun Vs city comedy about fixed boxing matches pre dates the Robert Wise classic by 15 years. It's an altogether different tone but with a similar theme: set-up boxing bouts. This one is played for laughs and sappy romance.....the attraction here definitely being the very rude and outright vulgarity of the comedy. Durante is flapping about snozzling his ridiculous comedy style with double meaning retorts and, glamorpuss bra-less nightclub floozie Lupe Velez whilst clearly not wearing underwear beneath her silk gowns has a neckline plunge so low it's a wonder viewers didn't see the map of Tasmania, so to speak. One outright hilarious scene with a French waiter saying "Oui Oui" repeatedly gets yelled at by an exasperated Durante who says "Alfonse! Will you stop wee weeing all over the place". Durante's theme song "Inka Dinka Doo" was obviously a gramophone hit in this era and gets a show spot all to itself. The laughter of Depression viewers in giant old theaters would have lifted the roof on many occasions in this one hour sparring match of one-liners. Everyone gets walloped, even Mother belts Hubby's showgirl pick-up square on the jaw in reel one. Stuart Erwin plays his usual "aww gee" hick character, and James Cagney's lookalike brother (astonishingly so) William, plays Mc Swatt the bad dude boxer also chasing Lupe's hemline. It's a very funny film. The DVD disc available in shops in Oz is OK, more like a DVD rom with some grainy pixilation. Made by Reliance Pictures, who sound like Majestic or Liberty or Chesterfield Pictures, all poverty row outfits of the time, I have a suspicion it is again, a faux Tiffany Production: they folded in 1932 but clearly kept the lot running as various other "name" brands used the facilities. The production values of PALOOKA a very good with the style of decor and design of a Tiffany Production.