‘Well, that’s the way it is. You’re a fighter, you gotta fight...’
I’m a sucker for a boxing movie. It is, after all, the most cinematic of all the sports. A truly great boxing picture can capture the ugly poetry of life in the ring whilst also using the fighting as a symbol for something else. The Set-Up, a 1949 boxing melodrama from prolific director Robert Wise (West Side Story, The Haunting), is much closer to Raging Bull than to Rocky, and the result is a gritty and visceral film that deserves to be better known…
Bill “Stoker” Thompson (Robert Ryan) is an aging boxer on the eve of what will probably be his final fight. What Stoker doesn’t realise (but the audience does), is that his manager, Tiny (George Tobias), has taken money for his fighter to take a dive. Audrey Totter also appears as Stoker’s long suffering wife, Julie.
Taking place in real time, a full three years before High Noon was exalted for the same reason, The Set-Up is a powerful and authentic film in which the violence is shocking, the audience watching the fight are baying for blood, and the world of boxing generally is presented as a dark and cynical place full of sly and devious men who are dangerous to encounter. Stoker’s opponent, “Tiger” Nelson (Hal Fieberling), is backed by the mob and everyone involved in the fight is out for something. While this makes for a world weary outlook, it also grants The Set-Up a freshness and modernity often absent from films of this era. Art Cohn’s screenplay (based on Joseph March’s poem) allows the expressive and memorable dialogue to do a lot of the heavy lifting between punches, and at only 72 minutes, the action flies by in an instant.
If you love boxing films as I do, I would highly recommend seeking out The Set-Up. It’s a short, sharp punch to the gut that delivers from start to finish.
