How much was Primo Carnera's reputation damaged by "The Harder They Fall"?

"Its all true" Carnera.

 

It basically destroyed his reputation in Los Angeles to the point that it killed business at his shops and restaurant, which were very successful before the movie was released.

Carnera attempted to sue, but made the mistakes a lot of people do when starting a lawsuit such as hiring the wrong type of attorneys, since not only did they sue the wrong people, but even sued under the wrong legal theory, which resulted in Carnera's case getting thrown out. Even the judge, who handled Carnera's case Stanley Mosk was scratching his head on why Carnera's attorneys sued the movie studios and not the people that were behind the source of the misinformation and untruths.

On the other hand when footage was getting released from the Jack Johnson fight a lot of networks were selectively showing footage to present Willard as a fraud and a joke fighter and doing their best to push the narrative that Johnson took a dive. Unlike Carnera Willard didn't go after the networks, but instead went after Jim Jacobs and his partners, who were allowing the footage to be used in such a way when they knew better. Jacobs lucked out that Big Jess was extremely old and died before the lawsuit went to trial, but even then Jacobs and his partners wisely reached a quick agreement with Willard's family.