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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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Wasberg! Reggiori! van Dooren! Spartacus! Drapp! Bollet!

Eric Wasberg vs. Serge Reggiori 7/1/60

MD: This was 12 minutes JIP and we get the last ten minutes of it, and all I can say is that it was awesome. The VQ isn't quite as good as it could be. Both guys have very similar body types, similar enough haircuts. There were times that I could figure out which was which and times I couldn't, so I can't really do this thing justice. Maybe Sebastian can give you some better analysis here. Here's what you have to know from my perspective though. This was a middlweight match. The fans were very into it. While there wasn't a lot you'd call outright heeling or a severe lack of sportsmanship, it was incredibly aggressive. Everything felt turned up a notch. Explosive tight quarters dropkicks. Completely dislocating arm drivers. Every throw and every hold. And that's before they start the uppercuts halfway through. That begins with maybe the loudest single shot we've seen in this footage and it doesn't let up from there, all the way to the completely uncooperative looking press slam into a gutbuster that ends this. We've only gotten these guys in JIP matches and we won't see them again, so even though this was honestly exceptional, it's probably best to chalk this up as yet another sign of what every day French Catch could be like in this period

SR: JIP. We get about 10 minutes. Looked like a really good match mostly because these guys were doing some tight wrestling and also they really beat the shit out of eachother. Some of the stiffest uppercuts in this whole project, golly gee. Some amazing looking dropkicks too. Match was pretty heated and Reggiori drew a share of boos even though he was gentlemanly enough to help up Wasberg after finishing him off with a nasty military press into gutbuster.

PAS: This was some nice small space fist fight stuff. Both guys were just trying to decapitate each other with uppercuts, and the shots were so hard they actually sounded sweetened. The press slam gutbuster by Reggiori was a hell of a finisher.

ER: I wish we had the first half of this to see how their matwork advanced, but I love the slugfest we did get. Who knows, maybe they were kicking each other's ass like that from the bell? I have so very little interest for modern Japan forearm porn, but the passion in this and the variation in degree of contact and escalating bumps show how to do a great stand and trade. This is mostly Reggiori destroying Wasberg with heavier and heavier uppercuts. It felt like one of those great battles where one guy was refusing to die, making things worse for himself. I love how he kept ramping up his bumps, rocking back into the ropes, using them to stay on his feet, and how Reggiori kept after him. Wasberg shows he has life a couple times by rushing in with these cool shoulderblocks live I've not really seen. They were kind of like shoulder shrugs a boxer might use to create some space, only these shrugs packed legitimate power, knocking Reggiori back on his heels. The match ending KO gutbuster was wild, like the most violent version of Nikolai Volkoff's trunks yanking overhead backbreaker, like something the villain does to lose a point but cripple the hero in a fighting tournament movie. 

Spartacus vs. Jack van Dooren 7/1/60

SR: 1 fall contest over about 20 minutes. After the heated brawl in the previous match, we now watch Spartacus engage in some serious scientific wrestling. You’d think a gladiator would be more prone to having gruesome bloodbaths in the ring, but maybe those just didn’t make TV. Anyways Spartacus is a pretty elegant technician and there were lots of fun wrestling exchanges throughout. I especially liked a luchariffic crucifix pin attempt from van Dooren which Spartacus turned into a freaky deadlift and arm throw. Van Dooren eventually started working Spartacus over with nasty headbutts and kicks. The whole match kept building to the escalation for when Spartacus would return fire and when he did he just straight knocked van Dooren out with a massive elbow to the jaw. We’ve seen faces putting on extended revenge beatdowns on heels before that it almost felt like an abrupt finish but the build to it was so good that it paid off for me.

MD: Not quite as exciting as the last Spartacus match, but maybe harder hitting. Van Doreen was bigger, bigger than Spartacus actually. This was primarily set up to showcase Spartacus' many tools. Lots of escapes using bridges, cartwheels, and pure strength, all made the more compelling because he was visibly shorter. Van Doreen heeled it up more and more as the match went on, with the highlights being taking advantage during a handshake after a short arm scissors that Sparactus powered up and over the top rope. It was a hot crowd and they probably should have leaned into it more to get some more heat. There were moments in the last third which were a little flat. Van Dooren's headbutts always stand out when we see them. He can use them to punish a guy but also as a quick flash at the start of an exchange to give him an advantage. Spartacus had a good act, marrying the strength and athleticism with solid selling and a match-finishing fury.

PAS: I thought this was badass. Spartacus is such an odd quirky wrestler. He is this stocky escape artist with a wild counter for ever move put on him, crazy bridges, cartwheels, flips, he cannot be held down. van Dooren eventually stops trying to trap him and starts trying to stomp and headbutt him into oblivion. Spartacus then shows why he survived all of those lion fights in the Coliseum, by absolutely beating van Dooren down with elbows to the ribs, and a knock out elbow to the side of van Dooren's jaw which drops him face first to the mat. So many cool spots in this match, with Spartacus being one of the most fun guys in history to watch and van Dooren being a fine dance partner. 

ER: This was so good, and I actually thought it would fit in well with the very best French Catch we've watched. Spartacus has so many great escape tricks, a guy you really have to fight to take off his feet, and luckily for us van Dooren is a fighter. The Spartacus escapes are really fantastic, and I love how stubborn he comes off. It never looks like he's sandbagging spots, just that his opponent is working extra hard to make any headway. That struggle really peaked for me when van Dooren went for a big headscissors takedown, and by the time he leg strangled Spartacus to the mat it felt like a giant had been felled. Watching Spartacus not panic, shift his heels closer to the butt on his bridge, work his head out of the headscissors and get to his feet in one motion was super impressive. Plus, it never made van Dooren look weak, as the headscissors looked great and it came off like only a man with freakish body control could have escaped it. van Dooren moves the fight to throwing a ton of headbutts at Spartacus, crowd hissing and jeering, and the frustration the headbutts came from really landed. van Dooren tried to play Spartacus's game, but it's pretty understandable once he moves into landing headbutts and kicking Spartacus between the shoulder blades. I liked how those shots exposed some holes in the Spartacus armor, and his big elbow strikes during his comeback felt earned and victorious. 

Andre Drapp vs. Andre Bollet 7/15/60

MD: Classic match up here between an expert stylist and the worst rogue in Paris. The first fall was a showcase of Bollet's facial expressions as Drapp twisted him from one position to another impressively. There was more shifting from one hold to the next than we've seen much in the footage. Bollet would come back with inside moves: hair-pulling, leg grabbing off a rope break, shots to the throat, which he doubled down on when briefly on top. The second fall showed something we really haven't seen much of, delayed gratification for the fans. Bollet really worked to avoid Drapp getting his hands on him, using rope breaks and tossing his body at Drapp (both to set up headlocks and beales and also a battering ram) to avoid it at all costs. It was masterful stuff, balancing desperation and underhandedness and it paid off with the end of the fall. In the third fall they reset back to some stooging and comedy before building to a revenge-driven finish that still more or less protected Bollet. We have Drapp vs Delaporte from later in the year as well, and I'm curious how that is in comparison.

SR: 2/3 falls contest going about 35 minutes. We seem to be JIP’d slightly, which means we unfortunately don’t any Bollet pre match antics. This was very predictable but extremely high end executed predictable. Andre Drapp does some amazing wrestling and Bollet beats on him with nasty punches and stomps. I am totally fascinated with how this bodybuilder guy Drapp just wrestles like he’s El Solar. And I think Bollet threw more punches here than anyone else we’ve seen so far, it was like he just came back from a tour in Memphis. At one point he was giving Drapp the business in the rope and a lady got up and tried to pull Drapp out of harms way. I guess she just wanted to grab ahold of his leg one time. This was a bit long and had a kind of underwhelming banana peel ending but I still thought it was a strong showing for both these men.

ER: Matt's description of Bollet as the worst rogue in Paris made me laugh, and it's a great description of him. He kept the fans riled by sneaking in several cheapshots, which also made his genuinely great selling come off as crybaby-ish without actually being crybaby selling. Drapp would counter much of Bollet's cheapshots with punches right to the mouth, which Bollet would understandably sell as a man who got punched in the mouth. But the crowd would respond as if he was "drawing a foul" or overreacting! Bollet had some cool tricks, my favorite possibly being when he stood up while in a snug bodyscissors, and punched Drapp into releasing the hold. Drapp had really strong punches, and I loved how he sold Bollet's (first fall finishing) atomic drops, taking a back bump when the knee made contact with the spine. A lot of people sell it as a recoil, but Drapp's selling made it look like his legs had gone numb from the impact to the coccyx. The crowd was already treating Bollet like a coward, but his true cowardice came out in the second fall: clutching the ropes to avoid confrontation, turtling up to avoid strikes, clearly avoiding Drapp now that he was up a fall. Both Bollet and Drapp take big cartwheeling bumps to the floor here, and I dug how Bollet came out in the third throwing big closed fists, knowing the time for games was over, leading to a big moment where Drapp dropkicked him from behind to send Bollet flying super fast over the top to the floor. 

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Corne! Isreal! Les Blousons Noir! Husberg! Spartacus!!

Jean Corne & Ischa Israel vs. Marcel Mannevau & Claude Gessat 4/21/60 pt1 pt2

SR: 2/3 falls match going 45 minutes. It‘s Les Blousons Noir, venerable rudo team made up of Mannevau and Gessat. This was probably the first in very specific brand of French pro wrestling, a very fast paced light weight tag mixing high end wrestling with high end heel work. And it didn‘t even seem like something particularily new to this crowd. The workrate these guys had was just insane, going 45 minutes without really letting up, all while running the ropes so fast, bumping hard, working ultra tight pin attempts and hitting the worlds greatest european uppercuts. While Mannevau and Gessat were clearly indulging in outrageous heel antics they also came to wrestle, there are some slick takedowns and Gessat busts out a sick spinning jacknife bomb that felt like it belonged in a 90s New Japan match. Mannevau is the more animated of the two Blousons and he really looks like a cheapshot king here and I loved all his silent film antics with the tag rope, he was like Regal on speed. Most of this the Blousons backing the faces to their corner or locking in holds before raining down punches and kicks, before some violent retaliations and while mixing in fast rope running exchanges and straight wrestling. It is a really effective formula and these guys are kings at it. There were also well integrated ref spots including Mannevau stepping on the referee, and there is a deceptive near-finish where the referee uppercuts one of the faces.  Israel is the more animated of the faces and he has a real knack for infusing simple things with energy, at one point he comes in and does this neat spinning takedown and then some nasty knuckle grinding. The knuckle grinding really wasn‘t anything super difficult athletic-wise, something any random yokel wrestler could do, but the way he executed it he made it look like he was about to rip a guys leg off. The ending is a bit weird, they are 1:1 and resting in the corners after a fall while the announcer talks about Cognac or something, I am going to pretend it simply ended in a 45 minute draw, even though they delivered two great finishes and showed no signs of fatigue, this was a metric ton of high end wrestling although probably not that special considering they likely did this match 3 times a week.

MD: We get about 45 of this, two clear falls before they run out of TV time. There seemed to be some confusion up front on them getting the time when they did to begin with. This is our first look at Les Blousons Noirs, and while this one has been out there before, I don't think it is now and it's well worth watching. The commentator has no idea which is Gessat and which is Manneveau, but if I have it right, Maneveau is an amazing cheapshot artist, just a manic cheater of the sort that seems get cheapshots in at every opportunity, even when it'd be more effective to not antagonize the referee. Gessat really impressed me, bumping big, looking credible and tough, hanging with Corne and Israel. Just a really dynamic heel and the two of them together made a good unit. We'd seen Corne once in 59 and we'll see him a lot more, but I thought he looked a lot better here, already fulfilling the promise from the previous year. Lots of cleanly hit, dynamic spots, good fire (though not as good as Israel) and plenty of charisma. There was one moment where he bumped himself into being choked between the ropes that seemed to defy physics. Despite the length, between the quickness of the action, the frequent shifts between heat and revenge, and a healthy dose of comedy with the ref, who became more unkempt and unclothed as the match went on, the time passed quickly and enjoyably. We have another tag with these heels and one Gessat singles match I'm particularly interested in.

Robert Le Boulch vs. Jean Martin 4/29/60

SR: We get about 30 seconds of this before Le Boulch taps out to a spinning toe hold from Martin. No real sense of the match but I dig a spinning toe hold finish.

MD: There was something to see here but we didn't get to see it unfortunately. This starts with a guy on the floor and ends a minute later with him selling a leg and eating a spinning toe-hold. We didn't even get the bump. Ah well. In between matches they show three cartoon drawing which really do sum up French Catch, a guy getting monkey flipped with one foot, that bridging, cross-legged headscissors (like Mil Mascaras), and a forearm right to the face. That's 57-60 French Catch in a nutshell.

Spartacus vs. Eric Husberg 4/29/60

MD: Spartacus is exactly what you'd expect at first sight, a muscular guy dressed like a Gladiator. It's funny because Bernaert was working the Kirk Douglas resemblance, but I imagine this was the other promotion? Still, you'd think there would be money with these two facing off. Husberg, we've seen before, and he's dark-haired with occasionally beady eyes and a smugness when he escapes a hold or gets one over on his opponent, but after seeing so much Bernaert, I still somehow thought he'd be the face in this. I was wrong. Spartacus brought a lot to the table, legitimately good wrestling on the mat, intensity in key moments, power moves (the flipping cradle release power bomb we haven't seen in a while, along with slams and a backbreaker), and some real stylist escapes, half of which looked amazing and half of which looked unsteady. Whether it was true or not, you got the sense that neither man could keep the other down for long. Husberg would use more inside shots or cheap takedowns out of the ropes, but it wasn't until he really took liberties that Spartacus fired back with KO shots. We'll see him one more time and that should be interesting. Oh, and just in case neither Sebastian or Phil tell you, since I'm getting this review in first, Spartacus was Jacques Pêcheur. Go and google him and Gaston Glock together. You'll get a good story out of it.

SR: 1 fall match going about 20 minutes. It‘s Spartacus, baby. Spartacus really had a movie star look and very good build not to mention his amazing entrance gear. Also, about 37 years after this, he was a hitman and arrested after he tried bashing in the face of a famous gunmaker. Husberg looks about like if a middle aged investment banker randomly decided to get in the ring, and to my knowledge, never tried murdering anyone. This was a bout in a small venue in front of a receptive crowd. It was effective but also a bit minimalist and I felt Spartacus belonged on a bigger stage, something like a stadium if you will. Spartacus had some very stylized grappling and a unique way to do  things and I got the sense he could be a fantastic worker in the vein of a Franz van Buyten. Husberg was one of these violent heels who didn‘t do much fancy  but throw hard fists and forearms to his opponent. The bout escalated early with Husberg throwing some hard shots including a cool knee to the ribs while he held Spartacus in a keylock, but they slowed down, and I didn‘t get the sense Husberg was that great an opponent to showcase Spartacuses grappling. It was a good matchup though.

PAS: Spartcus was a bunch of fun to watch, I loved how he kept flipping onto his feet whenever Husberg tried to beal him, or monkey flip him. It was a great bit of shtick which never got tired or had diminishing returns. Spartacus also had some nifty counters on the mat, and he felt a little like a lucha maestro in a trios match where he wouldn't be able to really show his goods, but you could tell they were there. Finish was pretty awesome as Spartacus got tired of Husberg's shit and hit him with forearms including a hooking forearm which dropped him like a Joe Frazier left. Fun stuff, and I hope we get to see more Spartacus.

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