A Washed-Up Boxer and an Orphan

 

I guess sometimes I'm an easy touch. The Mighty McGurk (1947) is corny, full of melodrama and as predictable as a Hallmark Christmas movie. You know what is going to happen long before it happens.

Wallace Beery plays a former heavyweight champion (named "Slag" McGurk) who now works as a bouncer for a saloon owner (Edward Arnold) in the Bowery at the turn-of-the-century. The saloon owner, named Mike, wants to expand his business, but he needs to clear the Salvation Army out of the building next to his saloon to do so. He wants Slag to start a riot to get the S.A. declared a public nuisance and evicted.

But Slag has other things on his mind. Through mischance and shenanigans, he's ended up caring for an English boy who has just arrived in the country. The boy (Dean Stockwell) is supposed to go to a rich uncle, but he's lost the name and address. Slag bestows the name Nippy on the boy, who enjoys life with his Uncle Slag because he doesn't have to wash or go to school and he gets to hang out in saloons. Nippy also gains a loyal pet when he hides a dog from the dogcatcher.

Slag's plan is to eventually find the uncle, collect a reward and buy into a partnership with Mike.

Other characters include Mike's daughter, who is in love with a guy named Johnny. Johnny had also been a boxer--and a protege of Slag--until he injured a man in the ring and joined the Salvation Army. Mike disapproves of his daugther's choice of boyfriends.

As I said, it's all predictable. You know--without any doubt--Nippy will initially be devestated when he finds out Slag took him in for a reward. You know that Slag is going to do the right thing in the end, stop the planned riot and adopt Nippy. You know that everyone who is in love will end up together.

But I enjoyed the film regardless. Berry brings a gruff likeability to Slag, Edward Arnold is always good and Stockwell was a fine kid actor. (Heck, you can assume he'll grow up to be Al in Quantum Leap and perhaps he learned to smoke cigars from McGurk.) The black-and-white photography is excellent and the setting (both time and place) is inherently fun. 

Perhaps its a case where the predictibility of the plot is a comfort rather than a problem. There are times when a movie or TV show gives you the feeling that you are hanging out with old friends. The Mighty McGurk gives you that feeling.