The Champ (1979) on Netflix
Billy Flynn, a boxing champion turned horse trainer in Hialeah, raises his son T.J. A fight offer and the reappearance of the boy's mother, Annie, set up a struggle over the child.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb6.8/109,994 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes40%
Trailer
Plot summary
Billy Flynn won a boxing title and now trains racehorses in Hialeah, Florida, getting by on his earnings and on bets. He has raised his son T.J. since Annie, the boy's mother, left seven years ago, and the boy calls him Champ. When a boxer proposes a match, Billy brings T.J. to the gym, but the opponent fails to appear and Billy leaves in anger. Friends buy him beers and bring him home drunk. He buys T.J. a horse of his own with money from gambling. Annie then returns to Florida, and her arrival sets off a new contest over the boy, which Billy hopes to answer by fighting again.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Champ (1979)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
SPOILER
A 1988 psychology study that showed 500 people more than 250 different film clips found that the final three minutes of The Champ, in which the boy watches his father win his comeback fight and then die, produced the saddest response of any clip tested.- Robert Redford turned down the lead role, and Ryan O'Neal signed on next but withdrew after director Franco Zeffirelli refused to cast O'Neal's own son Griffin as T.J., judging the boy too old.
- Ricky Schroder won the Golden Globe for New Star of the Year for his performance, making him the youngest winner in the award's history.
- Filmmakers ran a six-month talent search through thousands of applicants for the role of T.J. and cast young Ricky Schroder immediately after his audition.
- Director Franco Zeffirelli decided to remake the 1931 original after seeing it again on television, saying it had struck him as a child because of parallels with his own troubled youth.
- The Champ was a considerable earner for its studio: by September 1979 it had registered as MGM's fourth-greatest success in the company's history.
