Day of the Fight
Encyclopedia
Day of the Fight is a 1951 American short subject
documentary film
shot in black-and-white and also the first picture directed by Stanley Kubrick
. Kubrick financed the film himself, and it is based on an earlier photo feature he had done as a photographer for Look
magazine in 1949.
boxer
Walter Cartier
during the height of his career, on the day of a fight with black middleweight Bobby James, which took place on April 17, 1950.
The film opens with a short section on boxing
's history, and then follows Cartier through his day, as he prepares for the 10 P.M. bout that night. He eats breakfast in his West 12th Street apartment in Greenwich Village
, then goes to early mass and eats lunch at his favorite restaurant. At 4 P.M., he starts preparations for the fight. By 8 P.M., he is waiting in his dressing room at Laurel Gardens in Newark, New Jersey
for the fight to begin.
We then see the fight itself, where he comes out victorious in a short match.
cameras that take 100-foot spools of 35mm black-and-white film to shoot the fight, with Kubrick shooting hand-held (often from below) and Singer's camera on a tripod. The 100-foot reels required constant reloading, and when the knock-out punch which ended the bout came, Kubrick didn't catch it because he was reloading. Fortunately, Singer did.
Day of the Fight is the first credit on composer Gerald Fried
's resume. Fried, a childhood friend of Stanley Kubrick, went on to score or conduct (or both) over 100 films. In 1977, he shared an Emmy Award
with Quincy Jones
for the music for the TV mini-series Roots
, and was nominated for an Academy Award in 1976 for Birds Do It, Bees Do It
.
Although the original planned buyer of the picture went out of business, Kubrick was able to sell Day of the Fight to RKO Pictures
for $4,000, making a small benefit of $100 above the $3,900 cost of making the film.
Day of the Fight was released as part of RKO-Pathé's "This Is America" series and premiered on 26 April 1951 at New York's Paramount Theater, on the same program as the film My Forbidden Past
. Frank Sinatra
headlined the live stage show that day.
Short subject
A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. No consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all...
documentary film
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
shot in black-and-white and also the first picture directed by Stanley Kubrick
Stanley Kubrick
Stanley Kubrick was an American film director, writer, producer, and photographer who lived in England during most of the last four decades of his career...
. Kubrick financed the film himself, and it is based on an earlier photo feature he had done as a photographer for Look
Look (American magazine)
Look was a bi-weekly, general-interest magazine published in Des Moines, Iowa from 1937 to 1971, with more of an emphasis on photographs than articles...
magazine in 1949.
Story
Day Of The Fight shows Irish-American middleweightMiddleweight
Middleweight is a division, or weight class, in boxing. Early boxing history is less than exact, but the middleweight designation seems to have begun in the 1840s. In the bare-knuckle era, the first middleweight championship fight was between Tom Chandler and Dooney Harris in 1897...
boxer
Boxing
Boxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
Walter Cartier
Walter Cartier
Walter Cartier was a professional boxer turned actor, originally from the Bronx in New York City, New York.He became a professional boxer after World War II. Film director Stanley Kubrick's first film, Day of the Fight , featured Cartier and his twin brother, Vincent...
during the height of his career, on the day of a fight with black middleweight Bobby James, which took place on April 17, 1950.
The film opens with a short section on boxing
Boxing
Boxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
's history, and then follows Cartier through his day, as he prepares for the 10 P.M. bout that night. He eats breakfast in his West 12th Street apartment in Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village, , , , .in New York often simply called "the Village", is a largely residential neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. A large majority of the district is home to upper middle class families...
, then goes to early mass and eats lunch at his favorite restaurant. At 4 P.M., he starts preparations for the fight. By 8 P.M., he is waiting in his dressing room at Laurel Gardens in Newark, New Jersey
Newark, New Jersey
Newark is the largest city in the American state of New Jersey, and the seat of Essex County. As of the 2010 United States Census, Newark had a population of 277,140, maintaining its status as the largest municipality in New Jersey. It is the 68th largest city in the U.S...
for the fight to begin.
We then see the fight itself, where he comes out victorious in a short match.
Cast
- Douglas EdwardsDouglas EdwardsDouglas Edwards was America's first network news television anchor, anchoring CBS's first nightly news broadcast from 1948–1962, which was later to be titled CBS Evening News.-Early life and career:...
as Narrator (voice only) - Walter CartierWalter CartierWalter Cartier was a professional boxer turned actor, originally from the Bronx in New York City, New York.He became a professional boxer after World War II. Film director Stanley Kubrick's first film, Day of the Fight , featured Cartier and his twin brother, Vincent...
as Himself (uncredited) - Vincent Cartier as Himself - Walter's twin brother (uncredited)
- Nat FleischerNat FleischerNathaniel Stanley Fleischer was a noted American boxing writer and collector. Fleischer inaugurated in 1922, encouraged by Tex Rickard, the Ring Magazine publication...
as Himself - boxing historian (uncredited) - Bobby James as Himself - Walter's opponent (uncredited)
- Stanley KubrickStanley KubrickStanley Kubrick was an American film director, writer, producer, and photographer who lived in England during most of the last four decades of his career...
as Himself - man at ringside with camera (uncredited) - Alexander SingerAlexander SingerAlexander Singer is an American director. He began his career behind the camera in 1951 as a cinematographer on the short documentary Day of the Fight, directed by his high school friend, Stanley Kubrick...
as Himself -man at ringside with camera (uncredited) - Judy Singer as Herself - female fan in crowd (uncredited)
Cast Notes
- The year after the fight chronicled in Day of the Fight took place, Walter CartierWalter CartierWalter Cartier was a professional boxer turned actor, originally from the Bronx in New York City, New York.He became a professional boxer after World War II. Film director Stanley Kubrick's first film, Day of the Fight , featured Cartier and his twin brother, Vincent...
made boxing history by knocking out Joe RindoneJoe RindoneJoe Rindone was an American boxer in the 1940s and '50s.Born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, to Italian immigrants, Joe spent the majority of his career competing in the middleweight division in the Boston area, often at the Boston Garden, under the aliases "Dynamite Joe" and "Sweet Joe." Rindone won...
in the first forty-seven seconds of a match (16 October 1951). Cartier had played some bit parts in movies before he appeared in Day of the Fight, and afterwards continued to appear occasionally in movies up until 1971, but he was most successful playing mild-mannered Private Claude Dillingham on the sitcom The Phil Silvers ShowThe Phil Silvers ShowThe Phil Silvers Show is a comedy television series which ran on CBS from 1955 to 1959 for 142 episodes, plus a 1959 special. The series starred Phil Silvers as Master Sergeant Ernest G...
for the 1955-1956 season.
- Alexander SingerAlexander SingerAlexander Singer is an American director. He began his career behind the camera in 1951 as a cinematographer on the short documentary Day of the Fight, directed by his high school friend, Stanley Kubrick...
was a high school friend of Stanley Kubrick's (they went to William Howard Taft High School in the Bronx), who acted as assistant director and a camerman for this film. He also worked on Kubrick's Killer's KissKiller's KissKiller's Kiss is a 1955 film noir directed by Stanley Kubrick and written by Kubrick and Howard Sackler. It is the second feature film directed by Kubrick...
and The Killing, and went on to have a long career as a director of hour-long TV dramas.
- Douglas EdwardsDouglas EdwardsDouglas Edwards was America's first network news television anchor, anchoring CBS's first nightly news broadcast from 1948–1962, which was later to be titled CBS Evening News.-Early life and career:...
, who narrated Day of the Fight was a veteran radio and television newscaster. At this time, he was the anchor for the first daily television news program, on CBSCBSCBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
, which would later be called Douglas Edwards with the News, and then The CBS Evening News. Edwards was replaced by Walter CronkiteWalter CronkiteWalter Leland Cronkite, Jr. was an American broadcast journalist, best known as anchorman for the CBS Evening News for 19 years . During the heyday of CBS News in the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the most trusted man in America" after being so named in an opinion poll...
in 1962, but remained a noted voice on CBS Radio news programs until he retired in 1988.
Production
Kubrick and Alexander Singer used daylight-loading EyemoEyemo
The Eyemo is a 35 mm motion-picture film camera which was manufactured by the Bell & Howell Co. of Chicago.-Background:Designed and first manufactured in 1925, it was for many years the most compact 35 mm motion-picture film camera of the hundred foot capacity...
cameras that take 100-foot spools of 35mm black-and-white film to shoot the fight, with Kubrick shooting hand-held (often from below) and Singer's camera on a tripod. The 100-foot reels required constant reloading, and when the knock-out punch which ended the bout came, Kubrick didn't catch it because he was reloading. Fortunately, Singer did.
Day of the Fight is the first credit on composer Gerald Fried
Gerald Fried
Gerald Fried is an American musician, well known for his compositions in film and television.Born and raised in the Bronx, New York City, Fried attended Juilliard School of Music...
's resume. Fried, a childhood friend of Stanley Kubrick, went on to score or conduct (or both) over 100 films. In 1977, he shared an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
with Quincy Jones
Quincy Jones
Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr. is an American record producer and musician. A conductor, musical arranger, film composer, television producer, and trumpeter. His career spans five decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 27 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend...
for the music for the TV mini-series Roots
Roots (TV miniseries)
Roots is a 1977 American television miniseries based on Alex Haley's fictional novel Roots: The Saga of an American Family. Roots received 36 Emmy Award nominations, winning nine. It also won a Golden Globe and a Peabody Award. It received unprecedented Nielsen ratings with the finale still...
, and was nominated for an Academy Award in 1976 for Birds Do It, Bees Do It
Birds Do It, Bees Do It
Birds Do It, Bees Do It is a 1974 documentary film covering sexuality in the animal kingdom. It was directed by Nicolas Noxon and Irwin Rosten, and co-produced by David L. Wolper....
.
Although the original planned buyer of the picture went out of business, Kubrick was able to sell Day of the Fight to RKO Pictures
RKO Pictures
RKO Pictures is an American film production and distribution company. As RKO Radio Pictures Inc., it was one of the Big Five studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chains and Joseph P...
for $4,000, making a small benefit of $100 above the $3,900 cost of making the film.
Day of the Fight was released as part of RKO-Pathé's "This Is America" series and premiered on 26 April 1951 at New York's Paramount Theater, on the same program as the film My Forbidden Past
My Forbidden Past
My Forbidden Past is a 1951 film directed by Robert Stevenson. It stars Robert Mitchum and Ava Gardner.. Adapted from Polan Banks novel Carriage Entrance by Leopold Atlas.-Cast:*Robert Mitchum as Dr...
. Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
headlined the live stage show that day.