Ievgen Khytrov: A Cold Wind Comes Roaring Straight Out of Brooklyn-The Ukrainian Lion

It was up over an hour ago. lol

 

The hat made me laugh - the thought that it was the first time I ever recall seeing a Ukrainian wearing a cowboy hat did actually cross my mind when I saw him put it on. lol

 

lol. Great movie.

Actually, Jack Palance (he was in a lot of Westerns) was of Ukrainian descent. Both his parents were Ukrainian immigrants. Unlike Khytrov, he wasn't born in Ukraine though. His real name was Volodymyr Palahniuk and coincidentally he also used to be a professional boxer too.

 

:rofl

Vitali in a stetson would look total badass. lol

 

How the hell could this slip my mind? atsch

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Sadly I rarely watch movies very often anymore but I grew up watching tonnes of them, especially older ones. Kirk Douglas was actually one of my mother's favourite actors and I subsequently became a fan too. Yeah, I knew he was of Russian ancestry (Belarus). Palance, Bronson and Douglas all looked like seriously hard *******s too. They all had that rugged and tough look about them.

 

Cheers. That was pretty incredible actually. You'd need the physical strength and agility of a gymnast to do a lot of that, not to mention a gigantic set of nuts. Doing it on a stationary object would be hard enough, never mind on a moving one. It does look extremely dangerous though.

I remember reading that upon hearing that Palance used to box. I'm no historian but I was familiar with Baksi's name from reading a couple of old boxing books I used to own and I knew he was considered a very respectable fighter. It says he was only stopped once in 73 fights - by the great Ezzard Charles in the 11th round, and even then that only because he was unable to continue because he claimed he could no longer see out of a cut eye. So Palance obviously lost (on points) to a very good fighter. I know you can't judge a book by its cover but you'd be seriously hard pressed to find someone with a mug like Palance's that wasn't as tough as nails lol.

 

Incidentally, speaking of actors that used to box (albeit this time only as an amateur). I remember someone posted this info on here a few years ago about the actor William Smith.

The muscular guy with the mustache in the Clint Eastwood movie Any Which Way You Can.

This guy

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I was never a fan of his or anything but my respect for him went through the roof after someone posted his CV and life accomplishments on here.

This is absolutely crazy. What a badass!

Biker, bare-knuckle brawler, cowboy, Bee-Girl fighter, vampire hunter . . . William Smith has done it all. He was born on March 24, 1933, in Columbia, Missouri, on Rolling Acres, a Hereford cattle ranch. After losing everything to the dust bowl, the family moved to California. From 1942, when he was eight, through young adulthood, Bill appeared in many movies as an extra (uncredited). After high school, he joined the Air Force and served during the Korean War and flew secret ferret missions over Russia while in the NSA. He studied at the University of Munich, and Syracuse University. He graduated cum laude at UCLA. Bill would go on to become one of Hollywood's best-known character actors, with over 300 TV and movie credits. On TV he played in many westerns (did his own horseback riding), cop and sci-fi shows. He's best remembered for appearing in Batman (1966) as, appropriately, Adonis in the last episode. He was a series regular in Hawaii Five-O (1968), where he played Det. James "Kimo" Carew (the episode with Cathy Lee Crosby, "The Kahuna," drew particularly high ratings). On the big screen, Bill is legendary for biker flicks (he does his own motorcycle riding). His first biker flick, Run, Angel, Run! (1969), was shot in 13 days for under $100,000--and made $13 million! This was followed by Angels Die Hard (1970). These early, ground-breaking features defined the genre, and would be imitated endlessly (but never duplicated). In the early 1970s, Bill got into horror films--playing a vampire slayer in Grave of the Vampire (1972)--and science fiction, in the camp classic Invasion of the Bee Girls (1973), where he fought killer insect-women wearing sunglasses. Just about everybody's favorite William Smith movie, though, is Any Which Way You Can (1980), where as a bare-knuckle brawler he had a knock-down, drag-out fight with Clint Eastwood that wrecked about half the town. Tougher than Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bill played his dad in Conan the Barbarian (1982), and was one of the few actors in the wildly popular, but critically lambasted, youth-oriented Red Dawn (1984) to receive any recognition from critics. He was in what could be called a textbook example of low-budget, campy sci-fi, Hell Comes to Frogtown (1988). Just about everybody who has ever worked with Bill speaks highly of him. He's educated, intelligent and energetic. A true legend in the business, Bill's acting career is still going strong in 2006, well into the 64th year of his career.

William Smith is probably best known for his portrayal as "Falconetti" in Rich Man, Poor Man (1976). He first came to the screen as a child actor in films such as Going My Way (1944) and The Song of Bernadette (1943), before entering the service during the Korean War. There, his fluency in five languages landed him in the N.S.A. Security Squadron 6907. While working towards his doctorate, he landed a contract with MGM and never looked back. Over the next thirty years, Smith became one of the kings of B-movie villainy. With a prolific number of roles in westerns, biker, horror, sci-fi, and action pictures, his face-and muscular physique-are familiar to generations of movie fans.

Appeared in the final episode of Batman (1966), the first episode of The Rockford Files (1974), and although he was in the final season cast, he was not in the final episode of Hawaii Five-O (1968), he received on-screen credit only.
Lifetime Achievement Award from Academy of Bodybuilding and Fitness
Record-holder for reverse-curling his own body weight.
2 Time Arm Wrestling World Champion-200lb class-Petaluma, CA
Served in the Airforce, National Security Agency, during the Korean War.
Graduated UCLA Cum Laude.
He was the Marlboro Man in the final televised Marlboro commercial.
Fluent in English, Russian, German, French, Serbo-Croatian.
Competed as a downhill skier in AAU events at Mammoth Mountain
Competed in motocross events with Steve McQueen and doubled as one of the track riders in C.C. & Company (1970).
Had a 31-1 record as an amateur boxer
Held the Air Force Light-Heavyweight Weightlifting Championship
Performed over 5,100 continuous sit-ups over a five hour period
Played semi-pro football for the Wiesbaden Flyers in Germany
Has a Masters Degree in Russian and taught Russian Language Studies at UCLA in the late 1950s.
Won a Muscle Beach contest by performing 35 inverted handstand dips
Honorary member of the Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures.
Direct descendant of Western figures Kit Carson and Daniel Boone.
Bruce Lee personally offered Smith the co-lead in Enter the Dragon (1973), but another film went over schedule and John Saxon stepped into the role.
Filmed an eight-minute test pilot portraying Caine for the TV series Kung Fu (1972), wearing prosthetic eyepieces to make him appear Chinese. The network wanted Smith for the role, but producer Jerry Thorpe ultimately deemed him too muscular and menacing.
Studied kung fu for eight years with Jimmy Woo and kenpo karate master Ed Parker.
Stunt doubled for former Tarzan Lex Barker while living in France.
Turned down the role of Tarzan at MGM.
Training partner of first Mr. Olympia, Larry Scott.
Fought California wildfires in the early 1950s
Worked as a lifeguard on the French Riviera
Worked as a trainer at Bert Goodrich's Hollywood Gym
Child actor in both "A" and "B" movies of the 1940s. He stated in a horror magazine that during breaks on the set of The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), star Lon Chaney Jr., treated all of the children on the set to ice cream.
Threw the discus 151 feet at a time when the top AAU distance was 150.6 feet.
Won the Light-Heavyweight German-Austrian Boxing Championship while in the service.
In 1942's The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), he plays the boy who throws the little girl's ball to the top of the roof. This role marks the first of his many appearances as a villain.
Has a master's degree in Russian.
His favorite writer is Fyodor Dostoevsky.
Recipient of the 2008 Silver Spur Award.
Recipient of the 2005 Southern California Motion Picture Council Award.
Inducted into the Venice Muscle Beach Bodybuilding Hall of Fame 2010.
Auditioned for a role in Django Unchained (2012).