Tuesday is French Catch Day: Mantopolous! Israel! Catanzaro! Lemagourou!

Vassilios Mantopolous/Ischa Israel vs Billy Catanzaro/Gilbert Lemagourou 6/19/66

MD:  This was part of "Télé Dimanche", which was a popular variety show, and it took place in the show's studio. There's a white backdrop behind them and the crowd is all facing them from one side. There's a musical artist (Johnny Hallyday) sitting in on commentary at times and, interestingly enough, Catanzaro's wife and two kids were there as well. They ask her questions now and again but she doesn't seem particularly bothered or interested in any of this, even when he's getting routed. She's used to it. She does note he's also a delivery driver and does weight training every Thursday. His kids don't seem to think he'll win. Considering how often we've seen the stylist win these matches (most of the time really) that doesn't surprise me.

It's a fun setting and there's maybe a slight but only slight exhibition-y feel to it. In general you get the real deal and in 1966 I'm not sure if there were two wrestlers as good in the world as Mantopolous and Catanzaro. It's a welcome blast just seeing Mantopolous scrunch down as he entered the ring before pouncing forth and Catanzaro met him in kind. They did so many acts, so many bits, all sorts of little moments of trickery where Mantopolous would draw him in. It's not just that some of the bits are things I'd never seen before, but it's that they perform it so well. Mantopolous ties up Lemagourou towards the end and while Catanzaro breaks it up, it was the most believable I've ever seen the spot done. Likewise some of the Lady in the Lake bits. 

Lemagourou played his part well, a bit more of an oaf or a stooge. The straight man to Catanzaro's inflamed and put upon character actor. He'll walk right into Mantopololus' traps (or Israel's European Uppercuts) while Catanzaro charges into them, though he was also more apt to take big bumps over the top (including right into the judges which everyone loved). And Israel did well too, hitting hard when it was his turn and getting swept under by illegal doubleteams by the heels, though he was overshadowed by Mantopolous, but then most people would be.

There was real familiarity between Mantopolous and Catanzaro which let them do the bit at the end of the first fall where Catanzaro hit a tombstone position press-up facebuster only for Mantanpolous to reverse the second attempt for a tombstone or when Catanzaro hit his spinout backbreakers twice on Israel only for Israel to tag out and Mantopolous to hit Robinson and Conjuro backbreakers. There was once or twice where things seemed to get off the rails just a bit, but in general, this was meant to entertain and it absolutely did.

SR: Well, it's another 25 minutes of pretty amazing popcorn wrestling from maybe the most reliable crew in all of wrestling when it comes to this stuff. Seeing all these guys again so suddenly after we only got a few glimpses at them a few years ago is kind of a crazy occurrance. But here they are, doing their thing. They probably had this match like 500 times, that's how seamless and never lost they go about their wrestling. This had a cool setup being in a TV studio with a white background, tall referee in a smoking, you just can't have this stuff anymore. This had the typical formula, lots shine from your technicos, some rough moves from the heels, an absolute crap ton of sometimes comedic stooging and bumping to entertain the audience. You get the sense that this was probably a deliberate kind of TV psychology, give the audience something joyful to have a romp with. 

And these guys have endless shit they can do to fill the 25 minutes time. Mantopoulos with his endless bag of George Kidd style tricks, and Catanzaro and Lemagourou with their stooging, bumping and muggig. Catanzaro actually did some brief work reminiscent of his classic with Gilbert Cesca and it was cool to see that he could still do the crazy bridging. You can tell he lived this shit, both the classy gymnastic wrestling and the part when it was time to grab someone by the hair and stomp on their face. Mantopoulos is always made to look nigh invulnerable in these matches and its doesn't annoy me because he is so convincing, amazing how he still appears to treat the match a 100% serious with his body language, he never turns into a grinning clown like some of the british technicians will. I dug Israel as the more straight forward counterpart of Vasilios, he had this really great wrist takedown at one point and threw a sneaky punch that looked great. As far as the wrestling goes there wasn't a ton that we haven't seen in other French tags, but there was one piledriver sequence that was really crazy, and the stuff that lead into the finish was downright insane. 

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Von Kramer! Jones! The Alpha and Omega of Cesca vs Catanzaro!

Karl Von Kramer vs Ted Jones 8/1/87 

MD: As there's no sign of a suspected Prince Zevy/Flesh Gordon tag, this is our last match. It's a bit of an odd one, presented in the middle of what seems to be a Wide World of Sports type show called Sports Loisors. I have no context. Jones is billed as a Belgian champion, Von Kramer the German one. Both come out with young women presumably from their nationality. Von Kramer has an old manager dressed in a suit too and at one point the Belgian women assault him. Jones gets him once too. I have more reason to believe this is the Von Kramer from 25 years prior than I have reason not to believe it. You can extrapolate the age onto the wrestler we saw in black and white and he has the same sort of robe and overall look. I can't say for certain though. He's definitely not the Karl Kramer working in the UK at the time, that's for sure.

And you know what? It's a nice little throwback to end things on. They do work the holds. They try. Von Kramer goes over quite a few times on labored bumps. Jones works from underneath. They have a couple of holds where they hang on through the armdrags and what not. There are bursts of rope running. It's certainly senior tour stuff and we're not talking Mercier vs Montreal here or anything, but the good stuff is good and the bad stuff is forgivable here at the very end of our journey. Von Kramer might have been able to manage something in a tag with Richard and up against Hassouni and Bordes a few years earlier. The finish has Jones getting some revenge on Von Kramer in the corner and the ref pulling him back, which lets Von Kramer sneak in a low blow and score the win. Comeuppance comes while the credits are rolling. Not a terrible way to spend twenty minutes between watching cycling and equestrian on a weekend afternoon. A pleasant and forgettable farewell from France.

Gilbert Cesca vs Billy Catanzaro 5/1/57

MD: Which brings us back to the very beginning, the match that opened our eyes and our first and now last gift to you. We had bypassed it when we were going through 1957 as we knew it well, but now, here at the very end, I thought to take another look. It's good that I did too, because this is an upgrade on video quality to the version that's been out there. In the story of the footage, Catanzaro, spectacular as he was, only appeared a handful of times. In the later appearances, he represented the stooging heel that we saw so much of. Here, you just get glimpses of it, when, unable to escape a hold, he resorts to desperate shots; a seed of irritability that would grow in the years to come. He calms soon after and the process repeats, all the way to the handshake post-match. Cesca, on the other hand, feels like a stylist's stylist, part of that direct line from 1957 to 1987, through the team with Ben Chemoul, which gave way to Ben Chemoul and Bordes, which led to Bordes and Gordon. It's striking how much this represents some of the best stylist vs stylist work, the incessant holds and counter holds and forward pressing and struggle. It's also striking how much it leaves out, as it was just one aspect of one aspect of French Catch, even if it contained many overlapping specifics. Having watched this years ago, we couldn't have any sense of the breadth and depth and variety of it all. It's still an amazing spectacle though and so much more of their personalities and idiosyncrasies bleeds through with the higher video quality.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Catanzaro! Bernaert! Mantopolous! Montreal! Corn! Leduc! Henker!

Billy Catanzaro/Pierre Bernaert vs. Mr. Montreal/Vasilios Mantopolous 6/5/72

MD:  I'm amazed we didn't watch this one before. It could be that we saw it was a swimming pool match and decided against it because the few pool matches we've seen so far just haven't been great. This had a few things going for it though. First, it had Billy Catanzaro who is a singular, once in a century, stooging heel. It had Bernaert who is as professional a put upon bad guy as you'll find. It had Montreal who was one of the biggest positive surprises in all of the footage because even a muscle man, in France, was excellent. And of course, it had Mantopolous, who was imaginative, creative, deft, skilled, very over, whatever word you want to use, just a marvel. Even so, what made this work was that they treated the water like a big deal. The tag setting meant that Bernaert could get knocked out relatively early due to mishaps with his own partner, but they took twenty minutes teasing the reviled Catanzaro going out with any number of close calls. It ended up being a bit like an exploding ring match where they tease it and tease it and then finally pay it off, here with Mantopolous skinning the cat and taking Billy over, except for instead of pain and destruction it was a wet humiliation that Catanzaro was trying to avoid. The tag nature meant that Bernaert could suffer repeatedly and keep the fans happy and the gimmick fulfilled while the tension for Catanzaro finally crashing into the pool rose and rose. Once that happened they were already in the second fall and they could just keep building upon it.

There wasn't going to be much heat here. Some cheapshots, some tandem cheating, but it was almost always to set up immediate comeuppance for the bad guys. This was all about keeping the crowd happy and the interplay between Bernaert and Catanzaro was perfect for that. Catanzaro was a jerk's jerk, so much so that Bernaert, a jerk himself, was getting more and more furious at him. On the other side you had Montreal's strength spots and big hammering blows and Mantopolous flying around the ring, using tricked out takedowns, and lady in the lake turtling to make fools out of his opponents. This wasn't the most dramatic match we've seen but it was wildly entertaining the whole way through.

Gilbert Leduc/Jacky Corn vs. Der Henker 7/5/72

MD: This was actually a tremendous piece of business, maybe the most emotionally resonant match we've seen in the entire set. Corn and Leduc were true stars, wrestlers' wrestlers, absolutely tops on my list of babyfaces and stylists I've seen in this footage. They were heroes. Henker was another in the line of masked headsmen but he had an aura, hard shots, big power moves, believability. We'd seen him face off against Leduc and Corn in singles matches already and I wouldn't say anything in those made it inevitable that he could take on both in a handicap match, but they leaned harder into his power and presence here and laid out a match that caused a near riot and that left everyone looking better than they came in.

Early going here was Henker's power up against Corn or Leduc's skill. They would tag in and out and never double team or cheat. Leduc obviously made good use of his headstand and the Mascaras style headscissors. Corn would go quicker into the strike exchanges. Midway through the match, Henker was able to toss Corn out, to slam his head onto the post as he was trying to come back in, and then to drop him hard with a tombstone. The crowd banded together to carry Corn to the back leaving Leduc alone. Leduc did well at first, taking over and even going for the mask, but the ref held him back allowing for a Henker cheap shot and infuriating the crowd. From there, it was Henker slowly whittling Leduc down with big blows and power moves even as the crowd occasionally tried to storm the ring. Leduc would get pops every time he tried to get up, every time he threw a futile blow but Henker was just too much, or at least he was until, minutes down the line, Corn, head taped up, rushed back to the ring. He got the tag and the tide turned with Corn (one of the best late match sluggers ever) and eventually Leduc getting revenge on both Henker and the ref. From there, it was more about Henker surviving the onslaught and making it to the time limit draw, which, as I said, left everyone looking formidable and respectable by the end. The last shot is Corn and Leduc embracing to the crowd's delight. We've seen many matches that were technically better but maybe none that had more heart.

PAS: This was a blast. Henker is a big beastly dude, and I liked how the match built from more exchanges to big bursts of violence. You don't see much blood in French Catch and to see Corn just dripping after getting smashed by those nasty elbow/forearms and the posting was pretty memorable. Also the mass of people carrying him to the back like a martyred rebel leader was awesome. They had really established Henker as so formidable that LeDuc being one on one with him felt like he was at a big disadvantage. Corn coming from the back was iconic and his fired up comeback was some Lawler Mid-South Coliseum level great stuff. After all that I would have liked a more conclusive ending then a draw, but this was very cool stuff.  

ER: I wasn't sure what to expect from this as the handicap structure felt odd. Der Henker is a big man but not so much bigger than Leduc or Corn that a handicap match feels necessary, but these men had all been feuding for a year or more and this was two of the best babyfaces teaming up to rid France of this asshole Executioner. I'm used to German words sounding more ominous than their American counterparts, but I admittedly think that Executioner sounds much cooler than Der Henker. That said, tell every person in attendance that Der Henker doesn't sound ominous and they'd find you mad, as this man is loathed. I love when a French Catch match has these simmering social situations that just keep getting hotter until they boil over, leading women in their nice coats to charge the ring and yell in Der Henker's face.

Henker did a good job of fending off the fighting babyfaces, but things went up to the next level when he tossed Corn to the floor and posted him, then dropped him with a tombstone. Up to that point it had mostly been Henker defending and clubbing in response (with these weird but also cool elbow strikes that landed the entire inside of his arm and elbow across Corn and Leduc's heads), but this was an actual outright offense! The crowd actually carried the injured Corn to the back and I thought for sure that there was going to be a riot, as Der Henker had the stones to actually get out of the ring and face the crowd, more of them pushing closer to the ring every second. A kid, 12 years old tops, even starts to climb up the ring steps to get in before an adult grabs him! 

The match had given us a lot of holds to work out of and now was the time for the uppercuts to start landing. Henker kept winning exchanges, taking a lot of damage, but not staggering or falling to his knees, into the ropes the way Leduc was. Leduc's best attack was his cool slingshot into the ropes, Der Henker falling back hard - twice! - into the points of Leduc's knees. But Der Henker's excellent press slam gutbuster (a move that might have made me flip out even more than the French acrobatics, had I been alive and in attendance) and tombstone on made it seem like that bad guy was taking this, leading to the bloody and wild Corn returning to save his partner. The finishing stretch to the (admittedly disappointing but understandable) time limit draw was pure joy. Corn threw his closed fists to the side of Henker's head and really let loose with uppercuts. Der Henker got stuck in the ropes, the referee got monkey flipped into Der Henker, total madness leading to our draw. I loved how this kept building and leapt into something huge. 

 

ALL TIME MOTY LIST

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Le Bete Humaine~! Catanzaro~!Lemagourou~! Sanniez~! Remy~!

Jacky Montalier vs La Bete Humaine 2/8/71

MD: Young Jacky Montalier had a few things going for him. He really laid in his shots. He had any number of holds mastered and could hang on to them when needed. He had a cheering section of young ladies in the audience in a way we hadn't really seen. He even had a cool jacket with JAKY on the back (no C). Unfortunately, he was up against Willy the Shepherd, recently from Texas, also known as the deranged masked creature, La Bete Humaine, the human beast. We've seen pretty out there characters: Quasimodo, multiple headsmen, a hippy, a cannibal, even the Martian on the outside, but this might be the strangest. I had rushed this one out a couple of years ago and I called him a cross between Tom Magee, the Missing Link, and the Ultimate Warrior, and I'm still sort of feeling that. La Bete, despite being huge, could do a lot of the more athletic stuff you'd expect: leap to the top rope, hit ranas, do the over the top backflip out of a cravat, hit lunging dropkicks. And he was certainly full of out of control antics: pulling the ref's shirt off or tossing him over the top, tossing Montalier out repeatedly, tossing a fan over the top post-match. Mainly he liked to toss people out of the ring. So there was some skill here and Montalier tried to stay in it, but one thing La Bete didn't like doing a whole lot was sell, and that made this a few minutes of real curiosity and awe, and a lot more of awkward gawking at whatever the heck they were trying to accomplish in there.

Billy Catanzaro/Gilbert Lemagourou vs Albert Sanniez/Bob Remy 3/12/71

MD: Kind of amazed we haven't already done this one. Sanniez is someone I'm really looking forward to as we still have a half dozen matches with him remaining and he's been great so far. Lemagourou was a solid stooge here, hitting hard when in control and taking everything with enthusiasm, but it's impossible to stand next to the dynamo of energy that was Catanzaro. He just swallows up all the air around him, like a Jim Breaks on speed. He complained about every shot he took, only to run right into the next. He took every advantage like it was the most natural thing in the world. He fed every spot. He'd eat a dropkick right in the face, but not until scrambling around like a madman for positioning first. When they took over around the middle of the match, they controlled the ring well, drawing in their opponent and distracting the ref and put on a very credible beating. Catanzaro's tombstone set up facebuster and then the tombstone itself led the commentator to speak about crushed vertebrae, which is always what you're looking for in such a move. This never reached the level of the most insanely quick lightweight tags of this era, but they did pick up the pace well and then made things resonate with the character work so it was a good balance. Sanniez had some great escapes but Remy was able to hold his own too. I think we have one Catanzaro match left to go in 72.

PAS: Cantanzaro really has the feel of a guy, that if we had five more matches we could make a top 20 of all time argument. He has the Cesca classic, nothing for over a decade and then a couple of tags where he is working as a manic athletic heel and he is just mesmerizing. In perfect position for every big spot, bumping feeding heeling. Everyone else was good in this too, but man what a talent. 

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: BILLY CATANZARO! Duranton! Chaisne! Le Magorou! Mantopoulos! Louis!

 Michel Saulnier vs. Jetty Coster 06/03/60

SR: JIP match where get the last 8 minutes of a time limit draw. Jetty Coster, what a name. Saulnier was young and lean at 24 years old. Coster was bigger, but Saulnier was relentless and seemed to be tiring him out. Some quite amazing fast moving sequences here, including Saulnier backflipping and then popping up with a headbutt, and some neat pin attempts. This about served the point of being a fun scientific wrestling exhibition while folks sat there waiting to throw cigarettes at Robert Duranton.

MD: We get around 8 minutes of this. They'd already gone 22 or so. It's good action with a clever callback or two even in what we have. There's were a couple of great bursts of speed and complex spots, including Saulnier hitting a leap up to a victor roll though he had to grab the rope to do so. My favorite bit was a little later when Coster dodged another Victory roll but sort of shifting himself between the raindrops so Saulnier had nothing to hang on to. I've never quite seen that before. Otherwise, this could have used a little bit more focus. As it went towards the time-limit draw, there was a little bit of escalation with forearms but it was mostly Saulnier containing Coster by hanging onto an arm. This was our first look at Coster and he definitely hung with and based for Saulnier. We won't see him again so that's going to be my only impression of him.

Robert Duranton vs. Michel Chaisne 06/03/60

SR: 1 fall match going about 25 minutes. Last time we saw Duranton he was flamboyant. Now, he has returned with a bleach blonde head, a robe and an equally arrogant male valent. I would say it feels novel compared to his earlier appearance if we hadn‘t seen a murderers row of whacky characters ranging from masked hangmen to literal Quasimodo and motherfucking Spartacus on TV in the last few months. This was another heated match with Chaisne bringing the wrestling and Duranton bringing the cheapshots and swaggering. There were some interesting moments around his valet who had a few audience members going at him and even got into the ring to get thrown around by Chaisne one time. There was also one well executed ref spots that stood out because I am used to ref spots coming across as really fakey. Really liked the backbreakers Duranton would hit followed by those nasty short kicks. Chaisne doesn‘t sell on the level to make this an epic match but we get Duranton finishing him off in a quite brutal way. France sure wasn‘t afraid of having nasty bomb throwing for a finish.

MD: We've seen this exact match up back in 58 and at that point, it was entertaining but Duranton hadn't quite worked it all out. Here, his act was complete. He now had a valet in a tuxedo that he worked into his match as a prop. He was haughty before, but it was turned up a notch or two. And maybe most important of all, the wrestling was smoother and he didn't do anything outside of his physical limits. Chaisne is just an excellent stylist: right place, right time, right moves. He also had a familiarity with Duranton and played into his opponents gimmick: escaping holds by mussing his hair, going tit for tat with revenge spots mimicking Duranton's cheapshots or backbreakers, coming back from Duranton's peppering kicks with a big face twister. This was over 25 minutes over the two falls and through a mix of familiar spots and new ones, through working in the valet and the ref, through Duranton's reactions and general meanness and Chaisne's superior prowess and perseverance, it's entertaining the whole way through. You almost can't imagine it not being so. When the valet is finally most fully involved, as Chaisne whips him into a tied-in-the-ropes Duranton, you can see the delight on the faces of the fans. Duranton gets a lucky reversal towards the end of the first fall, dumping Chaisne over the top on a third monkey flip attempt, and that's basically the match, but it was fun while it lasted.

PAS: Chaisne is a bit Vanilla but a really skilled wrestler who can deliver some pop, which really makes him the perfect opponent for over the top characters like Kaiser or Duranton. Duranton was so great in this match, he was like Adrian Street's daddy, a flamboyant prancer who could turn into a vicious killer at the drop of a bow. There was some great stooge spots, Duranton walking away from a dropkick attempt to pose, only to get dropkicked in the mush, and some really nasty stuff like Duranton sitting on Chaisne's face and smashing him with body shots. I thought the finish felt a bit flat, we have seen some vicious beatdown finishes, and while the exchanges were great the actually moves which put Chaisne down weren't at the level I expect for French Catch KO blows. Still this had a ton to love, and I am all in on Duranton. 

Billy Catanzaro/Gilbert Le Magorou vs. Vasilios Mantopoulos/Francis Louis 8/19/66

SR: 2/3 falls match going about 35 minutes. Billy Catanzaro, baby. Regrettably we only got about 4 more matches of the man who started the craze in the French archive, but Billy Catanzaro is really making every single one count so far. This was right on the awesome match train. It was basically the worlds greatest IWE juniors tag with a bunch of elegant arm lock throws and takeovers interspersed with guys kicking the shit out of each other. Catanzaro was already a grimacing veteran heel here and while you’d love to see him work more straight matches like the Cesca bout, he is fantastic in the Finlay role. He does about a 100 awesome things in this match. The nasty face stomps, the stiff short kicks, the unexpected bitchslaps, a super fast spinning armlock that looked like it would pop your shoulder, some nasty face grinding, the way he got his foot stuck in the ropes when he tried breaking up a pinfall... at one point he just went and punched Louis in the face to break up a pinfall, which is a sure mark of an all time great. I also loved his missed european uppercuts. Gilbert Le Magorou felt a bit like he was Catanzaros trainee, as he looked a bit younger and did similar things to Catanzaro but a bit less extravagant. That said he was extremely solid and never a let up, but this was the Catanzarro show through and through. He looked just great at both the actual wrestling as well as the stooging and bumping for his opponents. 

Mantopoulos and Louis on the other were a great pair of tecnicos. Mantopoulos is of course someone with a million tricks, but I also really liked his elegant wristlock reversals early on. That kind of opening wristlock work is is hard to make compelling when you’ve seen geeks like Zack Sabre Jr. doing it to death but it looked classy here. Mantopoulos also has some of the more esoteric moves you’ll see in this project including that awesome swinging backbreaker that Julien Morice did in a World of Sport match once and  the GIF of it became semi-famous on certain image boards. Francis Louis was the more straight forward side of the technico team and while not as flashy as his partner I really appreciated his dedication to just wrestle and throw brutal European uppercuts when it was needed. The match had a few heat sections that were extremely well done, particularly all the interference spots from Catanzaro/Le Magouru, and a great moment where Catanzaro took a fall with a tombstone piledriver, immediately going for the same move in the next fall with his opponent barely escaping. The match built to some brilliant quick rope running exchanges, and most importantly there was a ton of asskicking going on. I have no idea how these guys just clubbed each other with thudding European uppercuts straight to the jaw and nasty short kicks for +30 minutes and never slowed down but I loved every second. For a fast workrate-like match it got pretty nasty towards the end with Gilbert looking like he was about to get KO’d by Louis. I would’ve liked Louis to finish the match as he was looking like the toughest skinny lightweight on earth as he kept smashing dudes with those uppercuts. But instead he tagged in Mantopoulos and the match ended in a pretty esoteric way. That said the journey is the destination when it comes to European wrestling and this match was a 35 minute monolith of brilliant wrestling. Which begs the question, excluding BattlArts and Futen is France the greatest place for junior tag wrestling of all?

PAS: Damn did this rule. It is such a bummer we have so little of Catanzaro, with almost a decade in between appearances. He is a very different wrestler here, much more of a trick veteran than an athletic marvel, but he is tremendous in every variation we have seen him. Mantopoulos is a fancy dude, his spinning wrist lock reversals, actually looked fast and violent, and that back breaker variation Sebastian mentioned was totally dope looking. Both rudo were great at feeding for the fancy tecnico offense, and would unload when they got a chance.  I loved the different ways the heels would get tied up in the ropes,  great bit of stooging stuff and a great way to for the faces to get their revenge. We get our traditional violent uppercut exchanges, with Le Magouru especially really getting great torque with his hips before throwing them, it was like a Joe Frazier left hook. Finish was a bit silly for a match with such violence with both heels getting tied up in balls and counted out, but this was still an all timer. 

MD: Thirty-five minutes of brilliant pro wrestling. At times, this had some of the fastest, most consistent, most elaborate chained spots we've seen as the heels keep feeding for Mantopoulos and Louis' takedowns and holds. It was often so quick and creative that the camera didn't know what to follow. That sums up the match as well as anything else. The heels weren't in charge much but they made the most of it when they were. Catanzaro was such an amazing jerk, one of the greatest characters in wrestling history, dancing and prancing around with excitement, making elated faces, as he laid in forearms, kicks, and stomps (immediately to beg off if he lost the advantage). He could go from sheer brutality to getting his foot caught in the rope on a dime. Le Magorou had a slightly out of shape junior goon look to him and he made for a great whipping boy for Catanzaro whenever they get foiled or clowned. They hit enough of their cheating and double-teaming to make it all credible and to make it matter all the more when it didn't work out for them. Louis always looks good, but Mantopoulos just goes above and beyond. He possessed great physical awareness in how he ducked a forearm or spun out before a takedown. It's as if the world moved half a step slower than him, which worked not just for wild spots but for seizing a normal advantage. Honestly though, they all went so fast when it was warranted that most exchanges started with a believable little fake out attempt. They went little with the fake-outs or Catanzaro's mean mugging, but they went big too, whether it was Catanzaro hitting two full nelson spins into backbreakers only for Mantopoulos to tag in and reverse the third with a Robinson backbreaker and then hit conjuro style spinning trapping backbreakers on both guys or when they trap both heels in the ropes and hit multiple alley oop body splashes on them. The back half of the match contained more of those elaborate set pieces and the crowd loved all of it, building finally to one of the more unique finishes you'll ever see.

ER: I loved this, and how could you not!? This is just the pinnacle of athleticism and personality through pro wrestling. I genuinely don't think there is any acrobatic wrestling better than this, nothing today compares to this. There are great athletes today, but none of them can work with the unpredictability and creativity of the men here. The unpredictability is the key, as you just never have any real idea of where some of these guys are going with their material, and yet nobody ever seems lost, nobody ever seems to be waiting too long in position, nobody does anything with their face or body to indicate they know what is happening next. Their misdirection skills are incredible, nothing in sight is telegraphed. It's incredible. 

This was such a thrill, with an excellent rudo team and two incredibly fun and capable tecnicos. Catanzaro is a legend of ours at this point, and it's great we now have two matches of his, a decade apart, with such different aspects of his abilities on display. This was like a hyperdrive William Regal house show performance from him, stooging around while throwing uppercuts so hard they looked like Louis and Mantopoulos weren't leaping to sell them, instead being lifted by force. He and Gilbert Le Magorou are such an excellent team of single strap stooges, and it feels like Catanzaro is so magnetic that he kept outshining the also excellent Magorou. Magorou looked and wrestled like the best possible Oliver Platt in Ready to Rumble. He had a belly and great floppy hair and Catanzaro knew a ton of different ways to fall into the ropes. Each seemed like they had cool ways to fall on the bottom, middle, and top rope, and knew a few ways to get tangled in the ropes (two heels both tangled by their ankles in the ropes is the kind of thing I picture a John Tatum/Buddy Rose team doing). Mantopoulos is a tecnico who is impossible to take your eyes off of, with some of the most beautiful step up headscissors, hardest dropkicks, has a few of these incredible pendulum backbreakers (like Norman Smiley's pendulum bodyslam, but ending on a backbreaker), and a killer spot where he vaults off Mantopoulos's knee, kicks over his head, and lands in front of him on his back just to hit a wicked upkick. We haven't really had a disappointing batch of French Catch yet, but getting brilliance like this match is rare. 

Unsurprisingly, we are adding this tag match as the 1966 representative on our All Time MOTY List. 

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Billy Catanzaro, Vasilios Mantopolous, Andre Bollet, Henri Bury

Andre Bollet vs. Henri Bury 4/26/57

SR: Another night in Paris where lumpy 50s gentlemen forearm the shit out of eachother. Bury is introduced as the champion of Belgium, I guess everyone wrestling in France was a champion then. Bollet is someone who will be a recurring figure to this project. With his thinning hair and greasy look, he has the vibe of a Kurisu or sleazier WAR heavyweight. This, like most of these matches, was a cool mix of wrestling and guys really laying into eachother. Bury brought some classy wrestling, doing cool escapes and athletic bridge up spots. Soon Bollet found his opening though when Bury was on the ground and the fun began with Bollet landing a big kick to the spine. Bury was less stoic than the French workers we have seen, he had really good, decently expressive selling, sometimes barely managing to beat the 10 count from Bollets beating. When it was time to fire back he would hit big beautiful dropkicks or savate kicks which were trippy to see. It‘s also clear that Bollet can wrestle, but he would rather punch you in the kidney. This goes 30 minutes but it‘s really good, nice wrestling and when they beat on eachother, they really beat on eachother. Nice finish with a series of badass strike exchanges leading the winner almost landing a lucky shot and sinking into the pin.

MD: We have a lot of Bollet in this collection, so it's good I really like the guy. He's sluggishly over the top, but at least this early, he can back it up with a clunky sort of effectiveness. That is, he can do a lot of what is peers are doing; it just takes him twice the effort. Meanwhile, he's overselling (including bumping over the top on a dropkick) and cheating charismatically and getting clowned. In some ways he reminds me of a Buddy Rose type, the sort that will get outwrestled by the babyfaces but still catch a lucky strike and pick up a win to frustrate the fans. Unquestionably, he was a larger than life character though. I liked Bury here, and it's a shame we won't see him again. He had a great Negro Casas style spinkick and some even better escapes, like a spinning headstand or even just grinding his own knee into the ankle to escape a headscissors.

I loved the finish to the falls here. The first had Bury come back with hard shots and a sunset flip after Bollet lost his cool and really unloaded on him. The second had things escalate to a Bury bull charge only for Bollet to turn the second attempt into a back body drop out of nowhere. The third had Bollet use the momentum of a Bury headbutt to bounce off the rope with a huge forearm. I imagine we'll see plenty more of Bollet aggravating the fans with banana peel wins throughout the years and isn't that what wrestling is really about?

PAS: It is such a trip that we get single appearances from guys like Bury, clearly Europe in the 1960s was just loaded with awesome grapplers that guys could show, rule and disappear. I really enjoyed all of his early slick grappling and frustrating of Bollet, and Bollet flipping out and kicking him in the back was a very pro-wrestling moment. Bollet is a blast to watch, and we really get a nice cross section of heels in this project, he is a real cheap shot artist and knows how to really sell out for the technico before sneaking in one of his cheap shots. Sebastian compared him to Kurisu and Matt compared him to Buddy Rose, how awesome is a Kurisu/Buddy Rose hybrid wrestler?

Vassilios Mantopolous vs. Billy Catanzaro 1/29/67


SR: One fall match that goes about 30 minutes. The fact that Billy Catanzaro has two televised singles matches almost exactly 10 years apart is surreal. A few things change in 10 years, and in 1967, Billy Catanzaro was a thick veteran heel. You could still see his brilliance in his work, even when he was more interested here in kicking his opponent in the spine and grimacing to the crowd. Even though it was very obvious that this was gonna get chippy, there was a ton of ridiculously high end technical work here. Mantopolous was a wrestling dynamo, no kidding about it. Just a ridiculously fast moving worker with a ton of tricks in his bag. Most of this was wristlocks and armlocks, largely built around Mantopolous holding on to a hold while Catanzaro was trying to get out. Bread and butter euro stuff, but these two execute it in such a high end manner it‘s not even funny. Catanzaro is a joy to watch, as he always finds neat twists on the most basic things, such as using his foot to win a test of strength on the ground. This was getting chippy here and there, with guys throwing unexpected bitchslaps and using the face scrape, but they mostly stuck to working holds with a few blindingly fast, well timed rope running exchanges thrown in. My one issue with the match was that it could‘ve used a bit of a bigger heat section on Mantopolous – Catanzarro did go to town at one point, lacing the Greek up with gnarly kicks to the spine and nifty backbreaker variations, but Mantopolous was soon back to making a fool of Catanzaro. Guess it wasn‘t 1957 anymore. It‘ll happen to all of us. Hell of a match with a sick finish, regardless.

MD: So, let's get this out of the way now. There's a fun moment in the middle where Catanzaro takes over with some backwork. He does these cool full nelson spin-outs into side backbreakers. After he hits two and some associated backwork, Mantopolous reverses the third spectacularly, and takes back over (with just a bit of selling). This match would be unmistakably better if there was five more minutes of Catanzaro grinding down on the back. Unmistakably better.

I'm glad I got that out of my system, because this was otherwise just amazing. Obviously we looked at this because of Catanzaro, but Mantopolous made me excited to see what he'd do on every lock-up. I can't even think of another wrestler like that. You can watch a hundred Negro Casas matches and he'll do a unique thing in each match. You can see a hundred fascinating, character-driven Fujiwara escapes. There'll still be a lot of rote and familiar, and that's fine. You need that for structure and familiarity, generally. Here though, every lock up leads to some bit of unexpected magic.

That's not to sell Catanzaro short either. I don't think there were many other wrestlers in the entirety of the 20th century that could keep up and play base. Moreover, he brought a subtle sort of offended jerk mentality all his own. There's a moment a little before said backwork where he's pressed into the ropes, shoots his arms up for the clean break, and then sneaks the tiniest slap in as Mantopolous draws back. That's almost, almost as artful as some of the float overs and escapes in the match. It's stuff like that which helps the match be more than just sizzle (even if it's the best sizzle) too. Mantopolous will do a crazy flying leg-over-arm leap to escape a hold. Later on, Catanzaro tries it and doesn't escape. Mantopolous sneaks a hand behind his back to give Catanzaro a handicap, an freebie: the first time Catanzaro refuses and taps his head; the second time, he gives in, goes for it, and gets driven to the mat arm first by a snaking leg for his trouble. Just brilliant stuff, so full of character on top of all of the explosiveness and skill.

I just wish it had a little more heat in the middle, just a little more, but I'm not so much a fool not to be thankful for the match we got.

PAS: This was pretty much Cantanzaro as Psicosis to Mantopolous's Rey Jr. in their WAR match. He was basically there to make of all of Mantopolous's crazy stuff look cool. Considering how awesome Cesca's crazy stuff looked in their match a decade earlier, it is clear that Cantazaro is an all time great baser. So much wild cool shit from Mantopolous, not only wild armdrag and legdrag takeovers, but a cool El Nudo, and one of the grodier tombstones I can remember ever seeing. I agree that it would have been nice to see Billy get to break out some of his offensive bag of tricks too, but that doesn't take away from what an impressive dance partner he was.

La Complète et Exacte French Catch

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THE MOTHERFUCKING INTERNET: 60's Lutte Libre- Gilbert Cesca v. Billy Catanzarro

This is a new feature on Segunda Caida where we take a road trip down the information superhighway and find weird and awesome wrestling matches that we would never get to see without the wonders of the World Wide Web.

Gilbert Cesca v. Billy Catanzarro

PAS: Some awesome guy is uploading 60's French Wrestling and this match is legitimately spectacular. I feel like I am being a little hyperbolic, but on first watch this felt on the level of an all time classic professional wrestling match, like Cesca v. Catanzarro needs to be in the conversation with Flair v. Steamboat or Dandy v. Casas or Tenryu v. Hansen. Thanks to an info video I can tell which guy is which, I can't promise the same in future New Wave Wrestling reviews. The first 12 minutes of the match was matwork and exchanges. It felt like a combination of lucha and british wrestling, it was really fast and really intricate. One of the really unique things was they way they locked up, it was kind of mix of a collar and elbow tie up and a knuckle lock, and they both had a ton of really interesting ways to work out of it. Catanzarro was the first to mix it up, as he counters a wristlock by flipping over and blasting Cesca with a really stiff forearm, he then quickly hit almost a snap ganzo bomb for the first big throw. The match was worked like that, mostly slick counters, ranas and monkey flips, with an occasional explosion. So much cool matwork, including the Santo spinning headscissors spot by Catanzarro, which gets countered into almost an Indian deathlock. By the end of the match fraternité has broken down and they are on their knees blasting each other with really stiff forearms, it had a real Lawler v. Mantell, exhausted brawl feel. Cesca is also hitting these great half pounce half topes off the ropes where he is just running full speed and smashing his head into the side of his opponents face. FInish was really great Cesca is viciously wrenching a hammer lock, with Catanzarro attempting multiple cool counters which are cut off, until he is finally able to flip over and land in almost a flash pin postion. I am excited to watch everything on this guys channel, because if the rest is even half this good this will be a goldmine of Black Terry Jr. proportions.

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