Tuesday is French Catch Day: Bordes! Cohen! Mantopolous! Rouxel!

Georges Cohen vs Walter Bordes 2/12/67

MD: This is our second chronological look at Bordes. Last time he was teamed with Ben Chemoul; I think he was billed as his nephew. They said he was 20 here and that makes sense, because we'll be seeing a lot more of him over the rest of the footage, even deep into the 80s. From what we can see here, that's not a bad thing at all. This was a stylist vs stylist matchup with a juniors feel. Lots of holds, a good chunk of rope running, and some chippiness in the last third. For that first half, it really felt like the older, more seasoned Cohen was working Bordes through his paces as they went in and out of holds; there was a long armbar by Cohen, full of lots of interesting escapes and looping back in. Bordes' stuff wasn't quite as interesting, headscissors and full nelson and later a straightjacket hold that led to Cohen starting to get chippy. Also, there was a moment or two where something he tried off the ropes didn't quite work or his footing didn't quite land right, but in general, it was an impressive match for the younger wrestler and the older one who likely led him through it and the crowd was appreciative the whole way through.

PAS: This is more of a chance to see a youngster with potential, then it was a great match. We have seen a bunch of these juniors matches before, and there was nothing here which particularly popped, but the athleticism was there, headscissors looked good and it got a little nasty at the end. This is such a high floor project, this was near that floor but it was still high quality stuff. 

Vasilios Mantopolous vs Jaques Rouxel 6/29/67

MD: This was a blast. Mantopolous was maybe as good as being a diminutive wizard as anyone in wrestling history. Rouxel was bigger and could be defined as a lug. When he finally lost his cool and started hammering, it was with these overwrought jumping stomps and clubbers. He had some cool stuff like a front cobra takeover and was more than eager to go flying over the rope for transitions when Mantopolous was able to get a little distance and get him to charge. Or to feed into dropkicks and armdrags. And his complaining was memorable enough. For the most part though, this was Mantopolous doing his thing, balancing fire and sympathy and underdog cheek with sheer mastery. He'd sucker Rouxel in with a hand behind his back, would use his momentum against him, would snatch a limb out of nowhere or keep a hold despite the size and strength differential. He'd do his little bouncing leap to start an exchange and get Rouxel to beg off in frustration and with the obviously knowledge that when it came to wrestling skill, he was outmatched, and then, to end it all, he'd tie him up in a knot that even the ref couldn't untangle. This was from Puteaux and the crowd seemed to be there more to be amused than to riot, but the lighting is so clear and crisp that you can see Rouxel's every reaction and every iota of Mantopolous' skill.

PAS: Very fun showcase for Mantopolous, he moves so effortlessly, and is really great at dancing his opponent around the ring. It has a very Johnny Saint vibe, although with more athletic explosion. The speed and pop of Mantopolous's headscissors are on another level from the stuff in the earlier match we reviewed. I liked Rouxel too, he had this Anaconda Vice like submission he used to ground Mantopolous, took a couple of big bumps to the floor and laced him up when he needed to. Match ending in a Neblina was a real trip, not a move I knew was around this long ago.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Bollet! Rouxel! Delaporte! Wiecz! de Zarzecki! Mr. Montreal!

Andre Bollet/Jack Rouxel vs.  Eddy Wiecz/Warnia de Zarzecki 11/14/65

MD: Another week, another show, another really good tag. Here Rouxel was positioned as Bollet's understudy (I think they said Delaporte was off fishing). We'd seen him even four years earlier, but whatever; it worked. He was a snippy goon who would make mistakes or get let down by Bollet and come back mean. While the last fall ended up a bit nebulous, there was a fairly clear shine/heat/comeback structure for a good chunk of this, with more of a southern tag feel than usual as Wiecz kept drawing the ref away in frustration to allow for the double-team. I've said it before, but he was a guy who really got how to get over. There was a moment where he'd been beat on for a bit and Zarzecki finally got in and tossed Rouxel out. Weicz went right after him to the floor and got revenge and then whacked Bollet when he came out for good measure. The finish of the last fall was really him just blocking a punch and firing back bit. He was endlessly flashy with the cartwheels and backflips, but also more inclined to take advantage with a cheapshot out of the corner or rushing across the ring to whack his opponent on the apron. Zarzecki was a good partner for him and Rouxel a good punching bag. Bollet was as over the top as ever and endlessly entertaining. The last fall was celebratory and lacking drama, like an old lucha match where the tercera was about the tecnicos clowning the rudos, but there was enough heat in the middle to make up for it.

PAS: I was really into Rouxel, he has such a hateable face, sneering puckered lips, you just want to see him get pounded and he really gets his comeuppance in the third fall. Wiecz (Carpentier) is the biggest legend (outside of Andre) we have in this footage and you can see why he was such a world wide draw. While he was known as a huge highspot guy in the US, he is hardly the flashy worker in France. But he has great timing, really knows how to make his flips and dropkicks mean something, and knows when to just let his hands go. He reminds me of Carlos Colon without the leaking. Bollet seems like his legendary opponent, and is such a brutal buffoon that you want to see him get his just desserts, and he goes big flying and stooging when it happens. Matt is right about the third fall lacking a bit of escalation but the entire ride was super enjoyable. 

Roger Delaporte/Andre Bollet vs. Warnia de Zarzecki/Mr. Montreal 12/12/65

MD: Last week had our last Cesca and Ben Chemoul tag and they felt like one of the best teams ever. We have a couple more with Delaporte and Bollet, including this match-up once more a few years later, and it's not exactly a tough statement to say they're one too. In 65, they were just off filming Left Handed Johnny West (or maybe the release of the movie) and they felt like stars. Bollet was as irritating as possible in every moment, a proto Buddy Rose who could go and stooge and hammer and jaw with the crowd. Delaporte moved more gingerly than any wrestler ever, like when Regal looked like he swallowed something vile, but turned up to 11. Here he seemed a little older, somehow even more toiled in his movements. As they aged, they came off like the world's most violent Statler and Waldorf. Zarzecki is a completely competent stylist and Montreal is one of the best surprises of the footage, relative to expectations. You have every reason to expect an empty musclehead but he's great just slugging it out and has a natural babyface charisma. We watch enough of these tags over the years and you can see tropes and tools develop. In late 65, we're seeing much more in the way of babyfaces trying to run and and the ref getting distracted by them than a few years earlier. When they're on top, Delaporte and Bollet control the ring well and they get real heat, even if there's always a patina of fun and the fans almost being in on the joke with them here as opposed to years earlier. The comeback in the second fall is downright celebratory, just a constant buzz and pop for one moment of comeuppance after another. And then, on a dime, the bastards can turn it right back on, with Bollet crushing Montreal at the end with a harsh slam into the corner and one of the first actual power slams we've seen.

PAS: Another really fun tag, with Montreal being the focus of the babyface team, and the killer heel squad of Bollet and Delaporte back on their bullshit. Delaporte and Bollet are like clownish hotel owners in a Tom and Jerry cartoon, you expect Delaporte to accidentally eat a hot pepper and have steam come out of his ears. As comedic as the heels were, they could switch and kick some ass too. There were some pretty nasty beatings laid on Montreal and the finishing powerslam was brutal stuff. The quality of these weekly tags is just off the charts. 

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Delaporte! Bollet! LeDuc! Gastel! Montreal! Sola! Bernaert! Rouxel!

Roger Delaporte/Andre Bollet vs Gilbert Leduc/Robert Gastel 12/14/61

MD: Great tag with four great guys. I have no idea why Gastel was on the side of the angels here but he came off as a folk hero and the fans loved to cheer for him. He would just mow everyone down with forearms and headbutts and the crowd ate it up. Leduc took a nasty bump on a fireman's carry into the heel turnbuckle early on and they just unleashed the most brutal, long beating on him with quick tags, slams and backbreakers, stomps, and even a somersault senton by Bollet that spelled his doom in the first fall. Eventually, in the second, Gastel had enough (they had done a good job goading him while in control) and rushed in to a big pop. From there it was fairly back and forth. Leduc sold his back for the rest of the match but had moments of fire. They built to a few big comeuppance spots like usual. Gastel had a way of taking the crowd back down after comebacks to set up the heels taking back over which were well and fine but he held one armbar for over four minutes without them working in and out of it and that was a bit much. Still, past that, these guys were masters and the match was masterful.

SR: 2/3 falls match. We JIP about 20 minutes into a 60 match. This is one of those matches which is heated as we join, and it stays heated for almost a full 40 minutes from that point forward. This was all about Delaporte and Bollet throwing hard punches and stomps, and our man Gastel being a real one and helping poor gentleman Leduc through the match by fighting fire with fire. Gastel being excepted wholly as a babyface by the audience is heartwarming. Bollet was doing those flip sentons to peoples backs like Tenryu being in a funny mood. This had quite a bit of back work, which didn‘t pay off in a major way. In fact the match had some unusual restholds and may have suffered a bit from being nothing but all these guys beating the hell out of eachother for 40 minutes, but these guys are great at beating the hell out of each other. The last 10 minutes or so are great though with Gastel throwing some awesome looking headbutts. I would‘ve liked to see the full thing, as these kinda heatfests suffer a bit when you don‘t get the early build. But knowing these guys, they may have gone for full on heat from the get go.

PAS: This was great stuff, it is really impressive the pace these guys can set in a 60 minute draw, we tend to mentally think of 20th century 60 minutes draws having long rest hold sections, but this was a go go pace. All of what we got were hard exchanges. Liked the contrast on the face team, with Gastel working like a third heel, and LeDuc being more of a technician (although in French catch even the technicians throw heat). We got two classic LeDuc headspins,  one the Santo style headscissors, one a spin out of a arm stretch, which was especially awesome. I loved Gastel's final heat segment, tying both heels up in the ropes and wailing on them with forearms. No real finish, and long matches suffer if they don't build to anything, although the work her was super strong. 

Monsieur Montreal/Ami Sola vs Pierre Bernaert/Jack Rouxel 1/12/62

MD: Another week, another show, another great tag. This is our second or third match with Rouxel and I really like him so far. He had this upstart attitude in how he'd disengage or lay shots in or interact with the ref or the crowd. Montreal leaned hard into the strongman gimmick (using the bear hug and a lot of his opponents making him look good by flying around the ring on normal exchanges) and at one point, he picked up Rouxel out of a headlock, deposited him on the apron, and knocked him off. Rouxel made sure to land in a woman's lap which popped her and the crowd. I like the guy. Bernaert (who wasn't teaming with Bibi here since Cheri was in training for another match apparently) was a perfect partner, a smarmy mentor in cheating and underhandedness. Yes, he managed a fake handshake into a forearm once here. Sola was as savvy as we've ever seen him, delighting in Montreal's strength spots, working the apron well, orchestrating a lot of the revenge spots; the best of those was probably a series of arm stretchers in the heel corner where they kept kicking Sola down when he tried to work to his feet. When he got an arm of his own, he yanked it back to the face corner and they repeated the spot on the heels in an over the top manner. It's interesting to watch things develop over the years. By this stage, limbwork/bodypart work is 100% a thing. It really wasn't a couple of years earlier. The first fall ended with the heels really targeting Sola's back. That led to a fun little moment (again showing Sola's presence and experience) when he rushed in to touch his opponent so that he could immediately tag back out to start the second fall, as you can't tag until you touched at least once. Good moment in a match full of good moments. Everything really came together here to make for yet another good tag. Others might disagree with me but I think the overall quality of the tag scene is better than a few years earlier, where there would be heat and intensity and big moments, but less tricks and narrative shortcuts, like the heels cutting off the ring or stopping babyface reversals from the apron or using the ref being distracted. In 61-62, there was just a great balance of the two elements.

SR: 2/3 Falls match going about 35 minutes. The Montreal/Sola team is pretty fun. Sola is pure technique, and Montreal is all about strength. Rouxel on the other hand looked like a slightly less blonde version of Bernaert. A classy guy who could wrestle but was simply more interested in cheapshotting guys. This built for quite a bit and there was some nice skill on display from Rouxel and Bernaert. Of course, their bread and butter is cheapshotting guys hard, and when it got to that they looked great. Especially liked Beraneaert loosening Solas jaw with a knee only to get giant swung seconds later. And well, Mr. Montreal and Ami Sola are great pair of faces to play off those vicious tactics. This wasn‘t as heated as the other tag but it felt more complete (not just in terms of how much we got to see) and well rounded.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Spartacus! Schnabel! de Lasartesse! Gamain! Debuf! Rouxel! Peruano! Daidone! Charret! Frisuk!

Spartacus vs. Hans Schnabel 1/7/61

MD: We went back and found this batch which was on the list but with a labeling issue. This is one of the best five minute matches I've ever seen. Schnabel was just awesome here, super aggressive, unsportsmanlike from the get go: refusing a handshake, refusing to engage, launching kicks from the double knucklelock position, quick to go to the ropes for a break. I loved his little stooging spin sell on Spartacus' uppercuts and forearms. Spartacus was the wrestling specimen that he always is. They had a great, brisk armbar spot where Spartacus kept shrugging off Schnabel's escape attempts, and it was a lot of square-jawed revenge for Schnabel's antics past that. The finish was pretty definitive with Spartacus hitting two of those flip bombs, the second tossing Schnabel across the ring, before KOing him with one of the best shots we've seen. Five minutes of perfect pro wrestling.

PAS: This was great stuff, like an awesome WCW Pro match. You have Schnabel as this honey badger, chewing on the leg of the big boy and getting thrown around. I loved those hard headlock takeovers by Schnabel, and his slappy strike combos. Spartacus just kills him dead with the flip powerbomb, including the second one which looked like Sid killing a jobber. I also liked the one shot uppercut combo, which left Schnabel flopping like a fish on a pier. Good stuff, and I want more of both. 

Jack de Lasartesse vs. Al Gamain 1/7/61

MD: Long, complete, excellent match that leaned into Lasartesse's strengths so well with Gamain a solid and persistant foil for him. Lasartesse was a heat magnet owing to the swagger and the commitment and also to the dissonance of towering over his opponent, of being dangerous enough to cut his opponent off with a single strike at almost every moment, of being able to bully him with constant slams or toss him neck first on the top, but also being so quick to disengage, to hide in the corner, to go for a hairpull, to take over with a punch to the gut that he'd claim was an open hand. They ran a number of spots at the start where Lasartesse would use a hairpull or shortcut repeatedly only for Gamain to show him comeuppance with the same hold, ending with Gamain finally slamming him. This is the sort of heel ace vs local babyface stuff we'd see from Flair or Bockwinkel or Buddy Rose but we haven't seen it quite as much in this footage. As the match went on, it was Lasartesse using his size and scumminess to lean on Gamain and Gamain coming back big. Lasartesse was sure to sell the effects of these comebacks, favoring an arm or leg for a few minutes. Eventually, he started sneaking in the strangleholds, wearing Gamain down and battering him at every opportunity. Due to Lasartesse jawwing with the fans on the apron, Gamain got one last big comeback but rushed in too much and got tossed over the top. The fans, so incensed at Lasartesse, helped him up and tossed him back in, but it was more or less over from there, ending with the bombs away and Gamain unable to answer the count.

Jean Debuf vs. Jack Rouxel 11/10/61

MD: This was a pretty well executed sub-ten minute strongman vs jerk upstart match. All of Debuf's escapes in the first half were fun and definitive with Rouxel flying across the ring for him. He'd be quick to rush in and grab the next hold only for Debuf to completely clown him. Eventually, Rouxel had enough and just unloaded, laying in relentless shots and kicks as the ref screamed and gave him warnings and tried to pull him off. Debuf would try to get the ref out of the way but Rouxel would take advantage of that momentary distraction and hammer down some more. Eventually, Debuf got a huge bearhug out of nowhere and though Rouxel went to the eyes in the most grisly manner possible to escape once, he couldn't the second time. Nice compact, thematic match with Rouxel leaning into his role and definitely getting Debuf over as an attraction, but I disagree with Sebastian that it was better than the Spartacus vs Schnabel one. Still, we have a Rouxel tag vs Ami Sola upcoming and a singles match down the line vs Mantopolous and I'm curious to see both of those.

PAS: Very similar structure to the Spartacus match, and it is a great structure. Debuf is cut up like coke, abs, arm definition big shoulders, and early in the match he rebuffs everything that Rouxel tries, I loved him just flexing his way out of the arm bar attempt. Rouxel tries a bunch of cheap shots to take a little bit of an advantage, including a nasty headbutt and some gross eye rakes, but ends up getting ragdolled by a bearhug for the finish. I think I liked the Spartacus match a bit more too, but they were both very entertaining bits of business.

Inca Peruano/Giuseppe Daidone vs. Michel Charret/Jean Frisuk 11/10/61

MD: Nice, long example of the standard French tag with underhanded heels and fiery faces. Frisuk had more slugging blows and a great spinning toehold, while Charret seemed both more technical and more apt to just throw himself at his opponent. Peruano was, of course, the most talented guy in the world, able to come at you from any angle. In the tag setting he didn't have quite as much flash, but he made up for it with meanness and by being involved in just about everything. The heels cut off the ring and made frequent tags and involved one another in what they were doing. Daidone came off as a mean jerk who would just lean on you. Plenty of double teams and then heel miscommunication leaning to comeuppance. The bombs were big, one literal as Frisuk one the second fall with a straight up power bomb with a flipping bridge and Daidone hitting a pile driver towards the end. When the heels took their falls, it was more due to persistence and grinding down than anything else. This was good, but what you'll generally keep with you was the babyface fire (two variations) and Peruano being a constant presence.

PAS: I really liked this, French tags are of a pretty high average quality, and this had some moments which stood out above that. Peruano is a goddamn wizard one of the slickest most unique wrestlers of all time. This isn't the match you are going to show someone to sell him on Peruano, but he is almost like Negro Casas, even when he isn't a focus you can't keep your eyes off of him. Daidone was a brutal prick of a heel too, at one point he was landing these gross looking forearms to the back of Frisuk's head, and his piledriver was really nasty. Charret had a fun spot where he kept flipping out of armbars, and could also bring the heat when needed, and Frisuk was nearly spinning heads around with his uppercuts. I would have liked to see the match end on the piledriver in the third fall, it was such a huge move that anything after it felt superfluous, but that was a minor quibble in an excellent match.

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