Tuesday is French Catch Day: Robin! Rene Ben! Cesca! Saulnier! Marconville!

Guy Robin vs Al Araujo 11/27/59

MD: This show was out there but I don't think we've covered it. It's our last look at a personal favorite of this footage in Guy Robin. He didn't disappoint. Robin's constant motion in his matches, one of the most hyper wrestlers I can think of. He's always sneaking a shot in (especially a kneedrop to the throat), always arguing with the ref or the crowd, always stooging back. Pure entertainment, this guy. Araujo, who we've only seen briefly and won't see again, had this great rolling leg pick takedown, a really fun seesaw leverage submission that's hard to explain and which he turned into a catapult late in the match, and a cavernaria. He was working from underneath for a lot of this though. I'm glad that my last image of Robin is going to be him missing a knee drop off the rope and getting DQed for having a violent hissy fit over it as people throw trash at him. That's probably how he'd want to go out.

Rene Ben Chemoul vs. Gilbert Cesca 11/27/59

MD: This was out before, but no one who had watched it previously could compare it to the Arroyo vs Chaisne match from a week prior, and that is 100% the natural point of comparison. Both are stylist vs stylist. Both go about 30 minutes. The match from the week before was more clever in its spots and escalated to something that was harder hitting, but this one might have had a bit more energy and verve at times, with a few more spectacular spots and dives. Both Cesca and Ben Chemoul wiped out big at times. Ben Chemoul went sailing through the ropes to nowhere to start the last third of the match. Before that, they worked long hold sequences with frequent escape attempts (including an absolutely beautiful flying entrance into a short arm scissors from a top wristlock that I had to go back and watch three times). After that, the match really took off with some great back focus by Cesca and subsequent revenge by Ben Chemoul. The end sequence, likewise, had Cesca totally wipe out and clothesline himself on the bottom rope. Post match, Ben Chemoul talked up Cesca and the fans were very appreciative of what they just saw.

PAS: Man was this great. This wasn't at the level of Cesca vs. Cantanzarro, but it was in the neighborhood. I imagine if this was the first French singles to show up, it would have achieved a similar level of acclaim. Some of the counters and twists and turns were as cool here as anything we have seen. Cesca had some really nastiness to his attack, grinding the spine with his knuckles in a way which felt a little past the congenial level of the rest of the match. This also had two of the crazier bumps in all of the footage. Chemoul takes a bump to the floor which was functionally a tope to nowhere, and Cesca massacres himself on the bottom rope before getting pinned. These guys show up later as a cool tag team, but it is awesome we get to see them matched up in a top flight singles match. 

Cheri Bibi/Pierre Bernaert vs. Warnia de Zarzecki/Ami Sola 12/11/59

MD: We get about 11 minutes that constitutes the last fall of this match. It gives us a concise unit with a lot of action up front as de Zarzecki and Sola make quick tags and beat on the heels. Best spot in this was Bibi shrugging off a Sola dropkick only to miss a charge and go diving through the ropes and eat a bunch of dropkicks (with Bernaert eating them as well) after he made it back in. I like Bibi more in these last few appearances than in the early ones. I don't know if he's gotten better of I've just gotten more used to him. He's just a bruiser and a goon, but he has a pretty good sense of when to give and when not to. At one point, Zarzecki tried to slip behind into a hammerlock from a headlock, and Bibi just jammed him and fell backwards with a quasi-German. Despite that, he was still able to work the style and hit an up and over headscissors out of a top wristlock. He was also a looming presence with his ever-present grin and a lot of bits of interference from the outside, especially on pins. Bernaert was a cheapshot artist as always, and he and Bibi made a good unit. We'll see them again. Zarzecki seemed off once or twice but hit more than he missed, including a giant swing, and catapulting Bernaert into Bibi in the corner. Sola didn't get to do his 'rana in this fall, but he had great strikes and maybe the first 10-count punch in the corner we've seen (which in this case was just three nasty elbows but you get the idea). He also did a tombstone which seems more prolific as a move at this point than it was half a year prior. Good stuff but we miss something for not having the whole match.

Michel Saulnier vs. Jo Marconville 12/11/59

MD: It's our first chronological look at Saulnier, trainer of Petit Prince and Andre and just an excellent junior all around. It's our last match of the 50s. This feels a little transitional. I don't know if that'll play out in 60, but this match felt like an evolutionary step from French juniors wrestling being the same as the heavyweight style, just quicker, to having more of the complex spots and acrobatic flourishes we'd see later into the century. Little things chained together that we hadn't really seen earlier like following up a monkey flip with an immediate dropkick or some new bits of athleticism like Saulner's victory roll late or one of his up and over escapes having a few extra bits of mid-air hooking and turning. He was a little clunky about 10% of the time, but what he hit made it worth it and his selling, which really stood out in the era, absolutely made you look past it. There was definitely a sense of general damage and weight as the match went on. Marconville more than kept up with him but he was forced into the role of base, whether he wanted it or not, just by Saulnier's skill. It would take him three kip ups to get out of a hold (normal for the era) and Saulnier just one. Occasionally he'd get frustrated and a little violent or tease something untoward, but he never dipped far in that direction. When he got a solid advantage, he might show largess with a handshake. It all came off as very human given the situation. Good match but it felt more a preview of what was to come than anything else.

PAS:  This was full of feats of skill, but never really came together as a match, kind of like a neat Nitro match which didn't come together but had three cool Super Calo things. Saulnier was slick as seal shit in here, flying all around the ring, constantly looking for headscissors and victory rolls. The only thing which will stand the test of time here, was the finish with Saulnier kipping up directly into a vicious headbutt for the win. Totally awesome spot, and something that an indy wrestler should totally jack. We have seen and assuredly will see better Saulnier and this was a nice tease. 

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Robin! Royal! Hessle! Liehn! Petit Prince! Louis! Noced! Richard!

Vic Hessle/Bert Royal vs. Edmund Liehn/Guy Robin 9/11/58

SR: JIP 2/3 falls match of which we get about 23 minutes. We join about just as the first fall is decided with a spinning toe hold of all things. After that, this is pretty much an all out brawl. Liehn & Robin are all over this, buckling the Brits to the corner and taking them apart like a leaner Anderson brothers. This is the only time we see Liehn, and I really liked him here, a car salesman looking stocky guy who looked like he was trying to pull peoples head off and not holding back with punches and forearms. Robin always looks great in these matches drawing heat and being a pesky shit, and he was great here once again diving off the top rope to knee people in the back. The brief bit where he just decided to slap the shit out of Royal with Royal taking him down and looking like he was gonna kill him had to be one of the best moments in this whole project so far. The job of Hessle & Royal was mostly to just hand out great looking forearms and uppercuts, and that they did. Hessle is the father of Bert & Vic Faulkner, so it‘s cool to have him on tape. He didn‘t do much extraordinary but he looked like a surly barrel chested dude from the local pub. He gave one of the heels a pretty painful looking face massage during a pin attempt and that is what you want from an elderly veteran type face in a tough brawl. Bert Royal is once again dynamite in this. He is so energetic when it‘s time forearm the shit out of someone, and his fast, super-vicious arm assault that left the other guy broken on the mat was awesome.

PAS: I loved every second of this, you had three barrel chested brawlers and Royal who was awesome at using his athleticism to hurt people.  Royal has this cool spot where he climbs up his opponent and knees him right in the face and was willing to throw just as hard as his opponents. Hessle had some of the most violent monkey flips I have seen he uses his stubby legs to just fling his opponent on his head. There is a point at the beginning of the third fall where it seems like everyone stepped out of the script. Robin starts slapping Royal, Royal takes him down (after Robin stonewalls a couple of attempts) and grinds his forearm into his face, which brings in Liehn who starts hammerfisting Royal, which brings in Hessle to throw a slap to the ear. It felt like something you might see in a Japanese interpromotional match. Finish was incredible with Royal just ripping and tearing at Liehn's arm with a spinning arm hold and knees.

MD: Very interesting match. It's our first look at Liehn. Robin is one of my favorites. Royal had the amazing match against Oliver and Vic Hessle is actually his dad. This is 2/3 falls and we come in around 15 mins in at the end of the first fall though we have another 20 plus of action. I liked Liehn right out of the gate. He comes off as big stooging blowhard which works well with Robin's manic alacrity. The difference between this and some of the Delaporte tags is more subtle than striking. The general idea is the same: cheating and swarming with big moments of babyface comeback and dominance. Here though, the comeback setpieces were fewer and shorter and the swarming was both more chaotic and somehow less cooperative. Instead of the elaborate counters and escapes of French Catch, the heels had one goal and only one goal, to get their opponents back to their corner. The ref was all but useless even as there was goozling and choking with the tag rope and Robin coming in again and again with knees off the top. In this regard it almost felt like a lucha trios where the tecnicos were just unable to stop the rudos momentum for almost mystical reasons. The heels were akin to rabid animals just tearing away and doing anything they could to keep the advantage. It made sense, for whenever they lost it, they were punished. There just seemed to be less orchestration behind it without someone like Delaporte directing traffic. Hessle was big and rugged, with meaty, satisfying punches. Royal was spirited, showing a lot of the righteous fire we've seen out of visiting Brits in this footage. Ultimately, this had less big moments (though it had a few like a big battering ram in the corner and the miscommunication between father and son that let the heels take the second fall) but created a very vivid feeling of dirty warfare. That'll stick with you, as will Royal's absolute destruction of Liehn's arm at the end, one of the best maulings to end a match and force a submission you'll ever see.

ER: This was nonstop French action that we've come to expect, a breathless pace a year before Breathless. All of this era Catch that we've seen has been great, but every few weeks we pull something out that is a cut above its peers. This was a perfect use of all four men, with Royal/Robin being the real marquee pairing while Hessle and Liehn brought a ton of personality to go with big clubbing arms. This whole thing was a real fight, the kind of match I can watch a few times and notice new things each time. Royal is such a scrapper, undersized compared with the other men but he sure doesn't act like he's undersized. He hits as hard as anyone here and had inventive ways of overcoming any size differences. I loved how he climbed up Liehn, almost like he was going to do a monkey flip and then thought "why stop there?" He climbs up bit by bit, clenching his neck with both hands, one leg at a time, before boosting off a thigh with a great knee. It was nice payback for Liehn practically cranking Royal's head off with a cravat earlier. Hessle brings a cool dad charisma to this, like a Catch Pat Patterson, and his scraps with Robin may have been my favorite parts of the match. Robin took out his hairline on the immaculately coiffed Hessle, locking in one of the sickest chokes I've seen. He hooked his arm around Hessle's neck like he was going for a judo throw but just leaned into the choke, throwing a punch to the kidneys when Hessle almost broke it. I loved Hessle coming in throughout the match to break up the heels, and how Liehn would subtly stooge for him, the best being one punch that knocked him back on his heels and onto his butt, holding his face and head like he wasn't expecting it. The finish was joy filled savagery, Royal twisting and kneeing and leaping on Liehn's arm with glee and a glazed over rage. It almost looked like Robin didn't want to step in and stop it because he didn't want any part of that Andy Capp dust cloud.


Le Petit Prince/Francis Louis vs. Daniel Noced/Jacky Richard 2/22/71

SR:2/3 Falls match going about 30 minutes. The evolution of the lightweight style in France is interesting to watch. Basically, they still did the same moves as 15 years earlier, but everything smoother, and with a formula in place, making these matches approach the same rhythm, similiar to a Lucha trios. You had the Prince and his partner Louis looking fantastic as you‘d expect, with lots of stupidly fast armdrags and everything being executed with a sense of struggle, and also a real standout performance from Daniel Noced. Not only was Noced a great base and dance partner for all the flashy shit in the match, when the time was right he just kicked the shit out of the Prince and even chucked Francis Louis over the top rope. The heel beatdown on the Prince was pretty intense with him eating a ton of kicks to the ribs and body shots as well as getting hammered into the mat over and over. It‘s also the kind of things that people who aren‘t used to European wrestling can watch and easily get into, as there were multiple cut offs building to the Prince finally getting the hot tag and Louis rolling in to give the heels what they had coming to them. The ring being pelted with garbage is an iconic sight too. The Prince remains the focus of the match though, as he soon eats a nasty posting. Noced takes a spill to the outside and a near riot breaks out, with folks surrounding him and the police having to break the scenery up. The ending with the Prince covered in blood looking to get a piece of Noced and towel being thrown in was something else too.

MD: What made this work as well as almost anything we've seen in the collection so far was the marrying of the slickness of Petit Prince matches with the patience and discipline of a narrative-heavy Southern Tag. It's equal parts spectacular and accessible; plenty of style, plenty of substance. We're talking shine-heat-comeback (and a breathtaking shine at that), with the added story element of Prince demanding to get back in, again and again, when he wasn't ready to fight in order to get revenge. When I say discipline, I mean that while there were a lot of illegal double-teams behind the ref's back to build up heat, the ref missing the hot tag didn't happen until right before the end of the first fall. They held it off until it'd mean the most and then almost immediately went to the finish of the fall afterwards. When you have a two-out-of-three-falls structure, you can do that. That's what built the fans up to a fever pitch and that allowed things to boil over as they went into the second fall. By that point the crowd was already throwing things into the ring. Obviously, we've seen that sort of thing before elsewhere. What really made this stand out here, though, was that this was awash in the 70s French juniors style. The hope spots here were Prince utilizing more and more elaborate escape attempts only for his opponent to either hang on to the hold or immediately thereafter cut him off and put him right back in. Basically, it leveraged what we've been seeing all throughout 57 and 58, the way they strung together matches with long, dogged holds and frequent escape attempts, and overlaid that onto the southern tag format. When your face in peril is one of the most athletic and agile wrestlers ever, a smaller underdog, someone who can portray a singular fire and passion, and your heels are a bunch of real goons: Noced who was an uppity bully and Richard who just had this meanstreak intensity to him, well, you're going to get results. Add in some color and that's a riot. The finish was equal parts triumphant and satisfying and heartbreaking and leaving you wanting so much more. Exceptional stuff.

PAS: This was awesome stuff, a true discovery. Much of the Prince we have seen before was like an early Rey Jr. exhibition match, like Rey vs. Psicosis in WAR. This was more like Rey vs. Eddie on Smackdown, a complete violent match with a dramatic arc and huge payoff. We still get some of the crazy takedowns and evasions from the Prince and he also gets the shit kicked out him, including Noced grabbing him by the side of the head and driving him into the mat temple first. We get a real hyped up hot tag with Louis throwing big uppercuts. Prince gets lawn darted head first into the ringpost and comes up bloody, and we get an awesome fired up bloody babyface standing tall moment, with the crowd trying to murder Noced. This is in the highest level of matches we have seen in this project, really an all timer.

ER: This was spectacular, like seeing a Michinoku Pro trios for the first time, except I'm not sure any of them were as good as Le Petit Prince (and those guys were GOOD). His sequences are so tight, so believable in their physics, this small man knowing exactly which way to swing the pendulum to make the most of his momentum. There are plenty of small wrestlers now who just expect larger wrestlers to bump for everything they do, and that's what happens. Most of the time, it looks absurd. Prince connects all those dots and makes it look crazy if one of his big armdrags didn't take someone down. He moves so fast that he makes typical time stand still moments look incredible, like when he crawls through his opponents legs to get the drop on them. He actually scrambles through opponents' legs fast enough that he is back on the attack before they turn around in real time! Noced and Richard are great heels for him to work his magic against, as Noced especially is a great base for his flying, and then cruel as can be when the tables turn. Louis is a wonderful babyface partner, taking a couple big bumps to the floor, always ready to fight for Prince. This whole thing really jumps up another level once the heel team starts cutting Prince off, with Noced and Richard putting the boots to them, like two Sonnys giving Carlo twice the beating he deserved. Noced had this running kick that was greater than any punt I've seen in wrestling the past several years. These two were just burying kicks in Prince's ribs and off the side of his head, to the point where a riot felt like a reasonable reaction. Fans immediately swarm Noced the second he hits the floor, with one tall Daniel Stern motherfucker leaping hard into the fray with a cigarette hanging out the corner of his mouth. That was an organic reaction inspired by tremendous ring work, the kind of match where you know you're watching something special the whole way through.


PAS: Hell of a week, which places two matches on our All Time MOTY list, with Le Petit Prince tag beating out  Tony & Roy St. Clair v. Vic Faulkner & Bert Royal for 1971. Bert Royal got bumped out of the 70s, but he stays on our All Time MOTY list with 1958.


ALL TIME MOTY LIST

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Rene Ben! La Barba! Guy Robin! Eric Taylor!

Michel Chaisne vs. Gilbert Leduc 9/20/57

SR: About 5 minutes are shown with much of that time spent in a short arm scissor. Seems Chaisne was getting a push at this time getting to do long technical matches on a regular basis. Of course, the crowd was silent for the holds but loved it when they started throwing strikes which lead to a very quick finish.

MD: This one feels like a real shame that we're getting it JIP. This is World Lightweight Champion vs French Lightweight Champion. Much of the six or so minutes that we get here are spent with Leduc holding Chasine in a short arm scissors and Chaisne trying to lift him up and out. We've seen this particular exchange plenty of times in the footage by now and while it was really nicely put on and Chasine did a good job with his struggle and selling, it's not really what I was hoping for with these two. The finishing stretch, after his escape, however, absolutely was, and might be the best finishing stretch we've seen yet, which is saying something.

Rene Ben Chemoul vs. Joachim La Barba 9/20/57

SR: 1 Fall match going a little over 20 minutes. The first sighting of Chemoul from the footage we have (chronologically speaking). He is already the formidable champion here. I get the sense is more akin to a Vic Faulkner type wrestler rather than some intense technician, and while his technique is stellar, I wish this match had been a little more serious. You know what you are getting from this match up, La Barba rudoing it up and Rene Ben Chemoul having the edge with technique before eating some shots and then turning the match into a bump-a-ton with Joachim stooging like crazy. La Barba is great, and while did get some shots in, I would‘ve loved to see Joachim La Barba crank up the violence and give Rene all he could handle.

MD: If we could only show people one match to sum up 1957 in French Catch, this might be the one I'd pick. It wasn't the most extraordinary match of the set and didn't have the biggest stakes or the blistering heat or the most advanced technical wizardry, but it was definitive and so complete, with sleek wrestling from Ben Chemoul, consistent and nasty cheapshots from La Barba, hot babyface fire in response, comedy, imaginative spots, clever counters, interesting bumps, constant struggle, some amazing use of the ref, visuals that most people watching wrestling had no idea existed before the late 80s, and an electric finish. This match is just memorable moment after memorable moment from two wrestlers that could obviously do a little bit of everything.

PAS: I adore La Barba, he might be one my favorite guys we have discovered in this footage, and we have discovered some legends. He is announced as being from Mexico, and while he has looked like Satanico's grandfather before, in this match he felt more like he snuck in the back door of Pirata Morgan's granny's house. He was an absolutely old school stocky bump fiend in this match, getting beeled over the top rope by his ears, flying through the ropes, and an incredible bump near the end where he got bounced stomach first on the turnbuckles a bunch of times, only to get flipped over the top rope.  He also had some nasty punches and great stooging. Chemoul is considered a legend and he is a great foil for the La Barba show, finish was one of the best rana's we have seen in this footage and this is footage full of great rana. 

Guy Robin vs. Eric Tayor 10/4/57

MD: Really happy that this one's turned up. I would have been in general, as it's Guy Robin, who is one of my favorite wrestlers in the footage so far in another singles match against a explosive young wrestler from England (remember, we've seen him against Al Hayes and the Fishers), but it turns out his opponent here is Eric Taylor, Dave Taylor's dad, at age 27 and if if Wikipedia is to be believed, just a few months after Dave's birth. As best as we know, there's no other footage o him available.

And this is a really good showing for both wrestlers. Robin is not as over the top as someone like La Barba or Kaiser, and it made sense that in the Delaporte tag, he, because of his relative smallness and more understated nature, would play second fiddle to Delaporte, but he's always a joy to watch. He has this spryness, deftness, quickness. He can dance around an opponent and sneak in a rabbit punch as well as anyone I've ever seen. His bumping is big without taking you out of what's happening and he sells everything he's hit with, both the pain of it and the emotion. Case in point here is how offended he gets every time Taylor hits a huge kneelift. It's a personal affront, and it's actually after one, early on, that he really turns up the cheating. You get the sense that, in his own mind, it was entirely justified, even when he flips Taylor on a handshake a couple of minutes later.

Because Robin is so quick to use a hairpull or cheapshot, Taylor really has to work for his advantages and he gets them by bounding across the ring and by just staying on top of things. If he makes a clean break, Robin takes advantage. That leads into the finish where Taylor is trying to hold the advantage after Robin took a big bump to the outside only to get caught by a kick out of nowhere. All in all, this was very good, and we saw some things out of Taylor we haven't seen in the footage yet, including a backslide and a full on torture rack that ended with Taylor depositing Robin over the top, and Robin using this cool inverted drop where instead of using the top rope as a clothesline for the throat, he dropped Taylor onto it back of the neck first. It had looked like we had another Taylor match later on but that had been mislabeled (maybe we'll still come across it), whereas this had been mislabeled to look like someone else, so I'm really glad that it ultimately revealed itself.

SR: 1 Fall match going a little over 20 minutes. I‘ve sort of grown to see Guy Robin as the Jim Breaks/Terry Rudge type of French wrestling. That is a pretty awesome descriptor, and he really rules as short tempered nearly bald guy who will put the hurt on his opponents and bump outrageously. This wasn‘t much worse than Robin/Hayes from earlier. Taylor (Dave Taylors father) is another not super charismatic guy, but he was sharp, up to the task and knew to drop bombs on Robin. He busted out the legbreaker – not a move I would expect in 1957 – precise dropkicks, and a quite awesome torture rack. Robin wasn‘t super expressive here, but he once again looked quite great trying to make his opponents life as miserable as possible. Kidney punches, jabbing the throat, kicking him in the ribs, even sort of proto-curb stomping him into the ropes – a stealworthy spot for sure. At 20 minutes this feels like it wasn‘t enough, but the surprise pin was cool.

PAS: This was a pretty classic 50s French catch match structure. Your cheapshotting heel gets more an more dirty, until your classic babyface gets fed up and starts wailing on him.  Taylor had a bunch of big offense, that torture rack into the hot shot was cool, and he hit a great dropkick Robin was mostly dirt, but it was filthy dirt, every heel in wrestling right now should be using quarantine to watch French Catch shit to steal. That curbstomp into the ropes is ripe for bringing back. I also love how French Catch heels find cool places on the body to punch, it is just the jaw or the forehead, you are likely to get punched in the kidneys or the side of the knee or the back of the head.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Chaisne!! Bernaert!! Fisher Brothers!! Delaporte!! Robin!!

Jo Rinaldi vs Robert Moine 7/11/57

SR: About 13 minutes of 30 are shown. Rinaldi is said to be Italian, which of course may be a complete fabrication. Moine doesn‘t show up again, and Rinaldi only shows up in these JIP matches, which I‘m a little salty about because both guys did some quality shit here. There was a particular cool sequence centered around leglock reversals that was the brainy type stuff I associate with European style matwork. There was also a great keylock escape that lead to a giant swing. They never threw strikes and then it goes to a time limit draw without ever heating up, so I guess it was that kind of scientific match. Still, it was cool to watch.

MD: Good thirteen minutes of technical action, JIP, before the draw. Rinaldi got a little dirtier at times and Moine a bit more heated, but in general they worked this clean. For two guys we aren't going to hear much from in this project, they both looked quite good. Everything was a real struggle, with a lot of back and forth counters and escape attempts (lots of trying to kick and jam and get a leg in). They both ended up in a joint leglock at one point slapping at each other's legs and selling appropriately for a moment after. They both went for a dropkick at the same time. One would go for a nose and the other would immediately return the favor. Very even in that regard. My favorite bit was probably Rinaldi catching Moine's leg as he tried for that grounded leg stamp we've seen a bit lately and turning that catch into a giant swing. I think we get another two minutes of Rinaldi and no more Moine and that's a shame. Really, if nothing else, it just shows the high baseline level of French TV wrestling in 1957.

Michel Chaisne vs Pierre Bernaert 7/11/57

SR: 1 Fall match going a little over 20 minutes. We go from Bernaert stirring shit up in a big way against Dauthuille to Bernaert doing a surprising amount of wrestling in this match. Although he did go back to his kidney punching, neck elbowing ways soon. Bernaert doesn‘t do much to truly set my world on fire, but he is solid enough to always be good for a niggly bout. Chaisne is notable for bringing really good babyface fire. Not quite as much here as he did in his match against Dr. Adolf Kaiser, so I guess Belgian jock who acts like a massive dick isn‘t quite as stirring as evil German Doctor of Philosophy. Once again, I felt the match ended a bit abruptly. This had such a lengthy build and we see so many matches where the heel ends up bumping like a maniac all over the place that the match just ending like that made this feel like a prelim bout.

MD: I'm higher on this one than Sebastian. Bernaert is extremely entertaining to watch. He actually got me here, too. After wrestling the first seven minutes or so clean and even holding an advantage on points (he was in control more often than not, hanging on to holds and even using a pretty nice Cobra Clutch style hold), he asked for a handshake and just clocked Chaisne for huge heat. This was just a week or two after the Dauthuille match too, so I should have known better, but sometimes guys flip from week to week depending on the opponent in this footage. After that, it followed a lot of the format of the prior match, with Bernaert doing anything he could to avoid comeuppance, most especially a long short arm scissors and endless heat-drawing leg dives. This felt very self aware, with Chaisne even catching him on one attempt with a big uppercut. That was one of the big moments of Chaisne getting revenge, another being a bodyscissors reversal out of nowhere (until Bernaert bit the foot to get out), and a third being the ref catching a hairpull and letting Chaisne back into it with these huge punting knees. To me the finish seemed a little abrupt but mostly triumphant, with a big hiptoss powerslam type move off the ropes and the post match shenanigans where Bernaert just wouldn't stop and Chaisne was forced to pound the heck out of him. To me, it was all tied together. Chaisne's a good, noble, straight-laced face but Bernaert was the star of this again.

PAS: I liked this a bunch too, Chaisne is a bit dry, but he is a fine foil for demonstrative heels. Bernaert is a really skilled grappler, he really hangs on to holds and grinds on them. Of course he is a dirty cheap shot artist too, his kidney punch, show the ref the open palm is a great bit of signature heel bullshit, I could totally see Doug Gilbert or Ric Rude using it. As a confessed short arm scissors superfan, this French footage has been a godsend, loved how Chaisne kept slapping his hand to keep it from going dead. I thought the finish was a bit abrupt, but it certainly heated up at the end, and those big uppercut knees leading to it, felt like a big babyface comeback. Hell that hiptoss powerslam might have been Chaisne's version of the Diamond Cutter or something. 

Roger Delaporte/Guy Robin vs Charles Fisher/Arthur Fisher 7/19/57


SR: 2/3 Falls match going nearly 40 minutes. JIP and the fans are already pelting the ring with garbage, enraged at the tactis of Delaporte and Robin, who were pulling every dirty trick in the book. This was an all out fight from beginning to end, no shots pulled. The Fishers did almost nothing but forearm and throw the shit out of their opponents, but it was some great looking forearms and throws. One thing I really appreciate is the chinlocking the guys will do to pull others away from a scrap, it‘s such a small detail but it aids to the barfight feel. Delaporte & Robin are constantly jumping on  the Fischers 2 on 1 and it‘s natural for a 4th guy to join the fray and try pull one of these bastards off. Aside from all the guys fighting, tumbling and climbing over each other you get some nasty armwork which while not being played up in the long run leads to a pinfall. I probably liked Robin the best of all the guys in the match, he did this awesome in ring tope to break up a hold, and he was always sneaking around to kneedrop someones throat. Delaporte was no slouch either and the faces convincingly play their role. It‘s a bit hard to rate this kind of match since it‘s basically a brawl worked like a sprint going 40 minutes with 2 breaks, it didn‘t have the kind of build I am normally used to from a wrestling match where it ebbs and flows, but as a heated slugfest it was quiet great.

MD: Forty minutes of extremely fun tag team wrestling, with a great heel side and some fiery faces. The latter are the Fighting Fishers from England, and I hate to admit it, but I really can't tell them apart well. I think it's Charlie and Arthur. They portrayed a rugged enthusiasm and the crowd seemed elated every time they scored an advantage and celebrated it. So much of that was because of Delaporte. He was a promoter as well as wrestler and we have him over twenty times in this footage and I think we'll thereby have the opportunity to claim him as one of the great in-ring villains of 20th century wrestling. He comes off as a slime and a stooge, but a formidable one, cheating at almost every opportunity even if just for the sake of cheating, yet unquestionably dangerous. Robin we saw vs Hayes early on and I really liked him as Delaporte's underling here. He had a bound to his step, this eager energy. When he interfered he'd leap over the rope into the ring to do so. He was lightning fast with his spots and really dogged and persistent with his limbwork.

This had a lot of heel control, as they were very good at cheating, double-teaming, constantly helping one another and dismantling a limb. We haven't seen much limb selling in French wrestling as of yet, but it's still very effective as a means for heel control, spotted with big comebacks by the Fishers. Early on, that was Delaporte's leg stretches off the ropes (and the double team version) which we've seen before. Fisher escaped that torment by headlocking both opponents at once and peppering them with knees, clearing the ring triumphantly. There'd almost always be a great heel miscommunication spot in these comebacks too. When the heels came back, it was with Robin endlessly driving Fisher's arm down into a Fujiwara armbar. Just again and again and again with that sort of bulldogging armlock. Fisher put up with so much of this that when he made his comeback, he tried to get his licks back in instead of going for the tag and ended up pinned for his trouble. When the Fishers do come back later on, they have a lot of fun stuff like a rolling short arm scissors and a giant swing. Eventually though, the cheating (including the first time we've seen ring rope choking in this footage) is just too much for them and the heels pick up the win with a pair of nasty shoulder breakers from Delaporte. The Fishers definitely keep themselves in the minds of the crowd by standing tall and furious in the post match. These tags can be exhausting but it's because they're so full of good stuff.

PAS: Really enjoyed Robin as the Spike to Delaporte's Chester, just running in and hitting all of these pesky high energy attacks. Loved him flying in and breaking everything up with a big headbutt. Liked the finish to all three falls, the giant swing into a big stacked pin was really cool as was Delaporte's shoulder breakers. I didn't get a huge sense of the Fishers, obviously skilled but I couldn't tell them apart and they didn't have much flash. Delaporte is a real prick in these matches so far and I am looking forward to see how he evolves, we have Delaporte matches up until 1984, so we are going to a breadth of his as a wrestler and I have a feeling he ages well.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Gilbert Leduc! Zarzecki! Di Santo! Allary!

Gaston Maujean vs. Guy Cavillier 5/30/57

SR: JIP with about 6 and a half minutes show. Cavillier is a weird looking guy in leopard trunks. He seems to have a freakish wingspan and a big head. The much shorter Maujen mostly beats the piss out of him. It almost has the flair of a rookie beat down because Maujean kind of blows off Cavillier's attempts at offense and continues to slap and stomp him like a bug. Cavillier had one really cool armlock takeover. Despite mostly taking a beating here, he manages to secure the win when Maujean eats a nasty upkick.

MD: At first glance, and this was admittedly not much of one, Cavillier was the least impressive guy we've seen so far. At the very least he had the worst uppercuts. Good wild clubbers though, and some strikes that were actually unique in a positive way. Some. A lot of what he did seemed like trudging through molasses, and when Maujean took over, he really brutalized him, to the point where you have to wonder a bit (which at worst is just good believable wrestling, right?). Even the iffier of the matches we've seen so far had some cool stuff, like Cavillier's takedown where he trapped Robin's arm with his leg off the ropes, or the finish which had a dire back body drop into a kick off and deep pin. I'd have to see more of Cavillier to really tell, but I don't think we have more to see.


Gilbert LeDuc vs. Warnia de Zarzecki 5/30/57 - EPIC

SR: 1 fall match that goes a little over 30 minutes. This was face vs. Face, not something that you saw on TV much. It felt a bit like something you‘d see in 70s AJPW, two guys doing some nice stuff in a long quality contest. Because it‘s France they do really try to take each others heads off with european uppercuts here and there and once in a while a guy will eat a nasty kick or elbow in the middle of an exchange, but they play nice all the way through. The wrestling was classy with both heavyweight looking guys busting out cool flying headscissors and working hard. Leduc is introduced as a world champion, while he didn‘t show a ton of charisma, he looked like a classy worker, and his escape where he headspins out of an armlock is spectacular. There was some excellent bodyscissors work and a handful of fantastic rope running exchanges that you would‘ve bought as plausibly ending the match. One of my favourite spots in old euro matches is the hip throw where the other guy has his arm behind his back and lands on his shoulder in nasty fashion, it‘s so simple but brutal looking. The match also had some of the more elaborate double leg nelson work I‘ve seen, which is one of the coolest old school holds. Great finish, too.

MD: This was excellent. It was a hard hitting technical match with a number of holds worked in and out of with extended "hanging on" spots. LeDuc was the de facto favorite as the Frenchman (my favorite bit of applause was when he hung on to a leglock while de Zarzecki was taking his face off with his foot repeatedly) but the match was worked cleanly and they'd begrudgingly give de Zarzecki applause for a solid counter.

The mid-match bodyscissors by de Zarzecki was one of the best sequences of its kind that you'll see (and we'll have a direct comparison in this week's other match too). The struggle as Leduc tried to escape and was slammed around the ring was perfect and they completely got me on a 'hope spot' out only for de Zarzecki to catch him again on a leaping pin attempt. And how he got out? It was that same sort of cradling lift up that we've seen previously, but this time instead of turning it into a slap, LeDuc just clobbered his skull with a forearm.

They then followed it with a bunch of mean strikes and a kip up that was reversed by an 85% complete Code Red. This is the sort of stuff that just happens in these matches, almost as commonplace. To great effect too. Here's a sign of how into this the crowd was: they count along with the ref to the ten count after LeDuc clobbers de Zarzecki with an Andre the Giant style knee to head crusher. I don't think we've quite seen that in any of this French footage so far. The match keeps building and building, escalating to this really cool LeDuc waistlock pick up into a submission with a leg behind the head that he seasons by peppering de Zarzecki's skull with lightning fast kicks and rubbing his face on the mat. The inevitable escape gave us our first French footage Boston crab. Then the whole thing finishes with an amazing flip up 'rana-attempt-into-an accordion powerbomb finish. Just top notch stuff. I feel like we get to say this every other week but this is one of the best matches we've seen.

PAS: Apparently LeDuc was the master of a La Toupie which is his headspin counter out of a headscissors, and it was awesome to see him break that out a couple of times to big acclaim. He also broke out the headspin when he put on the headscissors, and there was this great moment early when Zarzecki brick walled the attempt only to get smashed with an upkick. So many cool counters and reversals in this match, and also more chippiness then we see in the match next week. It breaks down multiple times including some really nasty forearms as ways to counter out of holds, and LeDuc doing some nasty smashing of Zarzecki's wrist and grinding into his face. Felt like Zarzecki was a bit of a dance partner in the LeDuc show,  but man is it a great show, and I am excited to watch much more of him in this footage.


Lino Di Santo vs. Michel Allary 6/7/57 - GREAT

SR: 1 Fall match going about 27 minutes. Well, seems we have hit a friendly stride in the French TV year, because this was another clean, fair contest. Maybe even the friendliest match so far, because not a single forearm smash or European uppercut was thrown until about 25 minutes into the match. This wasn‘t as good as the match between Leduc and Zarzecki the week before, but it was a neat match in it‘s own right: you had the theme of grizzled, older looking Lino di Santo trying to deal with his young, athletic opponent. Lots of good technical work throughout as we know it from the French grapplers. The key moment came when Allary locked in the short arm scissor and Di Santo, after trying several one armed deadlifts was unable to escape. Di Santo looked mentally defeated at that point, he tries to hit some uppercuts, but is too worn out. One of the coolest uses of such a simple hold I‘ve ever seen. Di Santo narrowly avoids defeat, sinking in a double leg nelson and hitting his brutal neckbreaker, but Allary has him on the ropes soon. In the end, Di Santo was able to survive just long enough until the time limit runs out. I‘m not sure whether this match had a 27 minute time limit or something, but it seems complete enough. This kind of „young, good looking guy gets the rub by going to a draw against a veteran“ is a staple of European wrestling, and Di Santos performance made it very worthwhile.

MD: Weirdly similar to the last match, worked friendly, with another long bodyscissors spot with a similar, but not as good, rope-running escape, and that same waistlock pick up into a submission with a leg behind the head but without some of the cool flourishes LeDuc utilized. Some of this was just too similar to be a coincidence even if I can't figure out exactly what was going on. This one suffered from LeDuc vs de Zarzecki being so good and so comparable, but picked up big in the last few minutes, with some great dead-arm selling by Di Santo (even as he was trying to throw forearms) and some big spots like a leaping 'rana and two killer Rude Awakenings.

PAS: I am a huge fan of the short arm scissors, and this had some of the niftiest short arm scissor work I can remember, with Allary really locking in this super tight scissors and DiSanto trying multiple methods of counter before finally maneuvering Allary into the ropes,  his arm is so numb that he can't even hit forearms which was a cool bit of selling. Much of this was solid technical wrestling although I don't think either guy did much to distinguish themselves amongst the pool of great French technical wrestlers (it's a great pool though, that is no dis). I did love the jumping rana into a kind of triangle. So much of this French footage has been on the shoulders of great heels, so naturally a face versus face match like this is going to miss a bit of spark, although the work was still very good.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Wiecz! Koparanian! Gueret! Bollet! Alfred Hayes!

Eddy Wiecz/Eddy Koparanian vs. Georges Gueret/Andre Bollet 2/23/56 pt1 pt2

PAS: This is the earliest French footage available, and is a hell of start to this whole project. This isn't the balletic, frenetic, athletic middleweight Catch we have seen. This is four heavyweights pounding on each other. We start off with the top wrist lock lockups which are a Catch staple, and there are some cool flips and takedowns out of those, including a great looking drop toehold by Bollet. The heels (Guret and Bollet) start mixing in some cheap shots,It starts to get chippy, and then just unloads into some absolutely super violent forearm and uppercut exchanges. This is Johnny Valentine level violence from all four guys, including Koparanian doing these super nasty half chop, half eye rakes. We get a first fall win with an airplane spin by Koparanian. There is some really great stuff in the second and third falls as well, although the vicious forearm exchanges at the end of the first fall were the apex. I really liked Weicz working a half crab, and there was this super cool spot where Koparanian kept turing a body scissors into a leg stretch. Finish run of the third fall was really cool with Bollet getting especially viscous with a shot to the back of the head, only to fall to a top rope dropkick/schoolboy combo, which looked more like a Fantastics finish from the 80s, then something from the mid 50s.

SR: 2/3 Falls match that goes about 40 minutes. Our journey into French wrestling begins with Edouard Carpentier of all people. He‘ll be interesting to watch, since he obviously stands out in the US wrestling scene, but in France he might be just another guy. Although I imagine he will definitely get a bump from watching this French footage. This match wasn‘t quite in the super athletic French style that blew all of our minds in the first place anyways, it was instead a classic heat mongering affair. Gueret seemed rather non-descript, but Bollet drew a really loud negative reaction as soon as he was announced. He was a towering guy, he could clearly wrestle, but you could sense that this wouldn‘t be a wrestling heavy match very soon. The match was the type that I imagine sent folks into near riots all across Europe in the post WW2-wrestling boom. It starts with some slick arm rolls and nice wrestling, but they soon get to the real meat. Guys get bitchslapped, cheapshots are thrown, and eventually you have a bunch of heavyweights throwing forearm smashes with abadon. Gueret did look a little bland, but he sure knew how to throw those forearms. The heels would soon start to try and buckle their opponents to the corner to deliver nasty 2 on 1 beatdowns, and the faces would retaliate with ear rakes which the crowd loved. Koparanian was kind of bastard too, he would bitchslap the heels and get in cheapshots of his own. The whole match was worked like this, there would be moments of well executed wrestling, only for someone to throw a forearm or cheapshot and things would fire up. It‘s quite a long match, but they keep the pace up. Add 3 fun finishes and you have one hell of a match.

MD: By all rights, this should have been our first match last week. It is the first match chronologically in the set, but alas, it took a little longer to find the second half. It's 2/3 falls, long, fascinating, dynamic, in many ways, very easy to understand and familiar while also being unique and alien as any new footage can be. There are familiar faces in Bollet (who we've seen not all that long ago vs Andre) and Weicz who would become Carpentier. It goes forty to fifty minutes and there's so much to cover. Look, we could spend a paragraph just talking about how they use handshakes instead of handslaps to tag one another.

Bollet was the real heatseeker and Koparanian, more than Weicz, the charismatic babyface (one excellent at milking a moment). Everyone stood out. We are inundated with footage, but I'm going to remember Guerret's forearms, Weicz' weird slicing chops, and just how much of a goon Bollet was (both in the action itself and how after he won the second fall as he pranced about with some trash flying in the ring). The faces (white trunks) were faces and the heels (black trunks) were heels. There was illegal double teaming and a few measured and over heel miscommunication spots in the corner. It was familiar enough that when you watch it, you won't be lost at sea.

I won't always do this, because it's a terrible way to write a review, but I know the rest of the guys will carry the narrative weight and I just want to make everyone understand just what has been uncovered and why all of you should stop what you're doing and watch it. There were a hundred little details worth noting; we could never get to all of them: Bollet not shaking hands at the start and later avoiding Koparanian to build heat and anticipation; how much French fans seem love the make-a-wish style submissions in this and other matches; how the heels utilized their side of the ring and how Koparanian just pounded his way out of the corner; how dramatic and expressive Bollet and Koparanian were when they were taking and putting on holds respectively; Guerret's hugely credible forearms and fists and how Weicz judo flipped him to reverse one; the endless feet face-twists as super over babyface comeback spots (really all the revenge spots, like Koparanian's rabbit punches after Bollet's examples or the tit-for-tat hairpulls on top wristlock takedowns; revenge spots are the best); the way they used jerk headpokes as an insult; Weicz stopping Guerret's interference shot on Koparanian from mattering by running in with an armdrag to keep Bollet on their side of the ring; the cool Koparanian body-scissors counter that involved hooking his own feet up around the scissoring ones; the heel neck work at the end including Bollet's deep vice and quasi-hotshot; how serious any pinfall attempt was: the finish, a full-nelson set up for a missile dropkick, was preluded by the momentum shift of a mere kickout and it absolutely worked; and the post match celebratory backflips (Bollet had to get into the act and I think the fans were chanting for Guerret to do one too?). This isn't even the half of it. There's so much to see. It's absolutely overwhelming, and it all somehow comes together as a coherent, emotional whole.

Bollet is so fun on offense (both in his underhandeness and how he'd occasionally do something super athletic, like a flip to set up a drop toe hold), so it's a shame he ultimately works from underneath so much. As with what else I've seen so far from this footage, I wish there was a little more selling. It's not that things don't matter, but a lot of limb focusing (be it hand-stepping by Koparanian on Guerret or Guerret taking out Weicz's leg from the outside, etc.) is more to set up the next spot/opening than something that plays into a longer narrative. In general though, it's astounding how far the style had advanced by the mid-50s and how well they filled so much time in entertaining and meaningful ways. 


Al Hayes vs. Guy Robin 3/22/57

SR: This French gem features a 29 years old Al Hayes. Aside from that, there is an obvious thought looking at the matchup: how will a British guy fit into the French wrestling style? The answer is they meet up in the middle and work pretty much a World of Sports style match without rounds, with Hayes working classy British escapes, and Robin bringing the French touches, although the sights of the match were set on a chippy bout from the introductions. There it is immediately noticable how this match is pretty much the Roland Barthes description of wrestling exemplified: Hayes, the clean cut, tall technician who never complains and is never unfair, against the short, balding, somewhat mishapen looking Guy Robin. And Robin really embraces his role to the fullest being a pesky little goblin. And he is a total show here, gesturing big, diving all over the ring like he was Gargamel trying to catch a smurf. His out of control bumping, mannerisms and cartoony stooging were really awesome and may have carried the match. That is not to disparage Hayes, who had some quite beautiful escapes and knew to lay in the european uppercuts when it counts. At one point he did a totally GIF-worthy escape from a cravate that was slow and deliberate like Arkangel de la Muerte, at another he just lifted Robin and threw him, and my favorite may have been his beautiful sweep from the ground. It was almost like carny Jiu Jitsu. The whole match had a slow and deliberate pace, maybe because both guys weren‘t familiar, but they kept it simple and effective, with Robin really bringing the funk towards the end , earning himself a few public warnings and trying to crack Hayes with nasty backbreakers and armbreakers. Hayes retaliated with some nasty face scrapes that seemingly bloodied Robins nose and got sold with BattlARTS style 9 counts. Classic formula match executed extremely well, and it was really cool to see the classy British technical style in place at this stage.

MD: At some point, I'm going to stop being in awe with what we gain in every new match. Not yet though. As noted by others, this was a proto-World of Sport style match, with Hayes as the youthful, intrepid, blue-eye and Robin as the underhanded rogue. We have almost no Hayes on tape: the Veidor match from the 70s, the 80 Heenan manager vs manager match where he's a defacto babyface, and very little else. I love Hayes vs Veidor and I think on some level, despite knowing how unlikely it was, I was hoping for another look at full on heel Hayes here. What we have instead is probably more illuminating, however, because it gives us a more rounded triangulation of Hayes as a wrestler and even some interesting early trappings of "Judo Al" with chops and some of the takedowns. It's also a good look at a very dynamic Robin as the frenetic rulebreaking stooge.

Robin leaned into his role, bounding back and forth early on like a spring, creation motion and energy. He was technically sound, though constantly outwrestled by Hayes, resorting instead to the behind the ref's back rabbit punches that were WoS standard, and adding in a backbreaker variation from that position cool single-arm drops, and pretty nasty knees. There was something almost Backlund-esque to Hayes, with his perfect posture on mares and the way he'd power out of certain holds, to go along with the more deliberate point-by-point escapes and the memorable escalating cravat escapes (first slow and then lightning fast). When he advanced to fighting a bit dirty, whether it be tweaking the nose to allow for an escape or the fisticuffs, it was all with a stiff upper lip. No jury in the world would convict him. The finish was a culmination of what came before, with Hayes bloodying Robin, reversing one of those arm drops, hitting the cradle powerbomb flip and just cinching in a deep accordion pin. Everything was precise enough that you could check your watch by it but it all felt perfectly natural and like a true athlete at work.

PAS: I thought this was absolutely great. Lord Alfred Hayes was a great character actor in the wrestling I grew up on, as sort of a Benny Hill drunk British goof in Tuesday Night Titans sketches. It is so cool to see him young and handsome and incredibly skilled. I loved the contrast in this match with Hayes as an incredibly slick mat master, and Robin as this twitchy aggressive hawk. He was like the guy in a pickup game you hate to play, picking up full court, pushing his chest into you while you are trying to drive, diving at your knees for a loose ball. Hayes worked at his own pace, and had some really beautiful counters, I especially loved all of his escapes from cravates. Finish was really cool with Robin landing these nasty Fujiwara armbar takedowns, and Hayes getting frustrated with Robin's bullshit and messing up his nose, and pinning him deep.

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