THE SQUARE RING

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 788, 27 August 1954, Page 21

THE SQUARE RING

(Rank-Ealing) LIKE to think that at the cinema I have a better stomach than many people for the uncooked facts of life-properly served, of course-even to the extent of an occasional second helping, but among the films in this class Champion is one I wouldn’t care to see again. The Square Ring has many points of comparison with Champion and its implications are just as depressing; but it’s much easier to sit through-partly because there’s quite a bit of light re-lief-and should get across to a wider audience. The setting is an English boxing stadium where the entire action takes place in one night. Almost at the beginning "Happy" Lewis (Bill Owen), a rising young boxer who never belies his nickname, makes a noisy entrance with several girl friends, and his noisy exit brings the film to an end. Sharing the dressing room with Happy are a string of fighters, all well played, whose public and private lives carry the story: a Welsh novice (Ronald Lewis) having his first professional fight; a punch-drunk pug (George Rose) with a grievance about being first on the bill; a dumb ox (Bill Travers) with a liking for science fiction; Rick Martell (Maxwell Reed), prepared to lose for what a racketeer will pay; and Kid Curtis (Robert Beatty), a former champion trying to make a comeback, whose fight provides the big drama of the night. There are some other interesting characters, toothe Kid’s wife (Joan Collins), Rick’s girl friend, a manager whose wife (Kay Kendall) has more than a professional interest in the Kid, a shabby promoter, a ringside bookie and his pals, and a dressing room "handler" (Jack Warner), who is wiser than most of the other people in the story. Interest never flags as the film cuts at a good pace between dressing room and ring, with occasional shots also of the Kid’s enstranged wife in an adjoining eating house to point up the tragedy of marriage to a fighter whose illusion is that hell quit aftér another year at the top. One of the tests of a film is the time it stays in your mind. This one haunted me. I couldn’t get rid of the sad-humor-ous voice of the punch-drunk, the face of the. Kid, the horrifying close-ups picked out of.the crowd, its roar heard from the dressing room, swelling each time the swing doors open, and the perennial strident march that at any sports gathering sends ydu home. The film catches an atmosphere that should :distend the nostrils of any boxing fan, though not every fan will find all of the story palatable-for it pulls no punches. The Square Ring is based on a play by Ralph W. Peterson. It was directed by Basil Dearden, who made The Captive Heart and The Blue Lamp, and photographed by Otto Heller, whose t-known successes include The Queen of Spades.