Baers portrayal in Cinderalla man??

Anything else you can expand on about Baer? - very interesting story, an hour ago I'd have thought he'd be the ideal HW champ to have dinner with... slim picking's the vast majority of champs turn out to suck, like most folks I guess lol.

 

The sad truth is that slanderous portrayals in Hollywood are more common than you think and there is very little legal precedent for the families of the deceased successfully suing over it. In the US free speech doesn't give one a pass to slander but it comes very close. If you want to sue your best bet is actually being the person in question.

The trope of Hollywood taking a real historical figure and turning them into a villian they weren't because the Hollywood story formula requires it is a very widespread problem with historical projects. If you or I spent a few hours digging we could come up with a few dozen Max Baers and its doubtful any of their families got a penny of compensation.

 

It always comes down to Primo being a damn class act. The man dined with prince of Wales, future king Edward, and conversed in French with his guests. He was a dedicated family man, a generous humanitarian, and naturally charming with the ladies. I wish my lass would look at me like cinema goddess Jean Harlow looked at Carnera.

The true slandered champion.

EDIT: Also, an actor, wrestler, and guerilla fighter against Mussolini and his Nazi lovers.

 

That’s the only personal account I’ve heard about Baer, but my grandma swears by him being a class act. Though her cousin the gambler was a very well known partier in the area back in those days, so even despite Baer being older then, not saying he didn’t enjoy the wild side of life a bit, as he was known to.

Other than that, I can only speak on interviews of his children that I have seen. His son claims that Max was a very gentle man who harbored great remorse over Campbell. I seem to vaguely recall him even saying that he had even heard his father cry in his sleep over a nightmare about Campbell’s death years after the fact.

 

“Nothing that ever happened to me—nothing that can happen to me—affected me like the death of Frankie Campbell. It was almost a week after the fight before I could get more than an hour or so of successive sleep. Every slightest detail would come racing back to mind, and I couldn’t blot from my eyes the last scene—Frankie unconscious in the ring, his handlers working on him. And then the news that he was dying … dead.”

- Max Baer

 

@Saintpat, I see your point, but Dick Turpin is much more interesting than the historical thug by that name, and few people read literature about a Romano-British warlord who may have been named Arthur.

It might be pointed out that Baer is more recent, but boxing fans seem generally to care more about yarns and folklore, if the relative sales of Bert Sugar vs (say) Randy Roberts are any indication.

If the historical research changes anything, it'll just make Baer into a different myth for the general public: the deceptive villain who pretends to be a lovable guy. Idol with feet of clay, based on a lie, the-Baer-your-parents-didn't-tell-you-about, etc. It's a very popular trope these days. And other anecdotes will congeal around that revisionist archetype.

It wouldn't surprise me if the actual, historical Baer did the stuff @FrankiesGal describes, but the Baer who goes into boxing lore won't be the historical one either way.

 

A lot of what you are posting on this forum simply doesnt wash with the facts. Baer did fight at least one exhibition in support of Campbells family and donated his entire purse as champion to the family, $10,000 which would be about $230,000 in todays money.

You have made a lot of claims about Baer raping and beating women that you say are found in transcripts of trials but anyone can testify to anything in court. Was it ever proven? Was he ever convicted of any of this? A lot of this information you seem to garner from Baer's divorce proceedings. Is it really uncommon for women to slander their husbands during divorce proceedings to paint them as a monster and get more favorable treatment by the court? Id wager this happens more often than not and certainly in an era when divorces werent granted as easily as they are today.

You accuse the referee in the Baer-Campbell fight of being paid off but what is your evidence and how did this supposedly influence the outcome of the fight? The descriptions of the fight make it clear it was a vicious grudge fight. Campbell went back to his corner after one round complaining that he felt like something in his head had burst and yet his corner, knowing this, never stopped the fight.

You say that a chief second was planted in Campbell's corner. You are obviously referring to Tillie Kid Herman. Herman had been in Baer's camp but he had a falling out with Baer and out of spite went over to Campbell's camp. Campbells gladly took him on as a means of goading Baer. Baer was furious by this and it added to the enmity between the fighters.

You say the boxing commissioner was profiteering off of Baer's fights? How? The commissioner was an independently wealthy man. He didnt need to profit from Baer's fights.

You clearly put a lot of stock in the first investigation into this bout that was ultimately found to be severely faulty and completely rejected. A second investigation was conducted by an independent panel that, unlike the first panel, had experience in the sport and found no wrong doing. The head of the first panel was sued for slander by the referee of Baer-Campbell (who was one of the most respected referees in the state and continued to be so for years). Did you ignore the findings of the second investigation?

You make a lot of the unanswered blows that Baer landed on Campbell but if you look at the photos of that fight Campbell was trapped in a corner, held up by the ring ropes, almost exactly like Benny Paret when he was killed by Emile Griffith. The referee was behind the fighters and Campbell's corner which was in a better position to know the condition of their fighter did nothing. Campbells death was a tragic event but it appears you are going out of your way to make a conspiracy of it.

 

Watched The Harder they fall yesterday with Bear playing Buddy Brannon (His real self if these claims are true) Great film

 

When you're Max Baer you don't need to chase. Women chase you. He was a good-looking lug with an Adonis-like body, money to burn and a fun-loving approach to life. And you're a heavyweight champion of the world. You're young and virile. How do you NOT have affairs with dozens of women when they're throwing themselves at you? Let's be real.