John Ford’s 1932 film Flesh is a far superior film than Arrowsmith, but that’s like saying getting stabbed in the face is better than getting stabbed in the eye; either way, you’re going to suffer. Real bad.

The story goes like this: Wallace Beery plays Polakai, a simple-minded German wrestler who spends most of his time wrestling, drinking beer, being strong manly man, and saying DATS GOOD. One day, Polakai comes across a helpless Laura Nash – an American woman who was recently released from prison in Germany – and decides to help her out. Laura Nash is played nastily by Karen Morley, who gives the character NO redeemable quality. She steals from Polakai, uses her sexuality to fool Polakai…

John Ford's take on pro-wrestling. And he dares to suggest that some matches are fixed! While there is a lot of wrestling talk, the only real wrestler to appear in this is Wladek Zbyszko, the lesser known brother of the popular World Heavyweight champion of the 1920s, Stanislaus Zbyszko.

Wallace Beery is the nicest brute in the Germany where he wrestles and works as a waiter. He falls for a confused lady who's just been released from prison. Karen Morley has no other choice then to accept his offers of kindness and ends up staying with him and his friends. However, her partner in crime and lover Ricardo Cortez shows up and together they continue playing the nice man for…

The lead role of a German wrestler (Wallace Beery) in this film is far too dopey for my taste, both in the character and the performance. This leads to some really lame humor especially in the first half of the film, e.g. slopping beer around, banging through a door instead of unlocking it, and accidentally breaking an egg. Karen Morley plays the woman with a past that he naively takes in, and things get a little more interesting when her lover (Ricardo Cortez) shows up. Morley almost always impresses me, and the scenes with just the two of them crackle with the tough banter of 1932, making me wish that they had somehow been more of the focus. As it…

John Ford’s “Flesh” seems to be exactly the sort of film that Barton Fink was trying to write in the Coen film. It’s a comedy! It’s a romance! It’s a gangster film! It’s a hooker with a heart of gold! It’s a WRASSLIN’ picture!

And it also is anchored by a pair of shockingly good performances from the leads. Wallace Beery in particular gives perhaps the best performance of his career as the gentle giant Polokai, and Karen Morley is superb as Laura as well giving a surprisingly varied and textured take on her character’s relationship with Polokai.

Surprisingly tender and funny and sincere and warm for the first half of the picture, the film quickly goes off kilter when…

You got the dough, and we took the rap, so it's your turn to play cards.
-Laura

Early John Ford movie that has some confusing information regarding it online. IMDB lists him as "unaccredited" but lists no one else as the credited director. Then in the trivia section it claims that this is the movie Barton Fink is trying to write in the 1991 Coen Brothers movie while Wikipedia claims the Coens had never heard of this movie while writing Barton Fink.

Now this film is a bit unintentionally funny as Wallace Beery plays a professional wrestler that at one point has a moral dilemma when he's asked to fix a professional wrestling match. How dare they ask him to…

The lead role of a German wrestler (Wallace Beery) in this film is far too dopey for my taste, both in the character and the performance. This leads to some really lame humor especially in the first half of the film, e.g. slopping beer around, banging through a door instead of unlocking it, and accidentally breaking an egg. Karen Morley plays the woman with a past that he naively takes in, and things get a little more interesting when her lover (Ricardo Cortez) shows up. Morley almost always impresses me, and the scenes with just the two of them crackle with the tough banter of 1932, making me wish that they had somehow been more of the focus. As it…

John Ford’s 1932 film Flesh is a far superior film than Arrowsmith, but that’s like saying getting stabbed in the face is better than getting stabbed in the eye; either way, you’re going to suffer. Real bad.

The story goes like this: Wallace Beery plays Polakai, a simple-minded German wrestler who spends most of his time wrestling, drinking beer, being strong manly man, and saying DATS GOOD. One day, Polakai comes across a helpless Laura Nash – an American woman who was recently released from prison in Germany – and decides to help her out. Laura Nash is played nastily by Karen Morley, who gives the character NO redeemable quality. She steals from Polakai, uses her sexuality to fool Polakai…