STREETS OF GOLD (1986) — Friday night fights at the movies!
September 16th, 2011 by Mr. C
Director: Joe Roth
Stars: Wesley Snipes, Klaus Maria Brandauer, Adrian Pasdar
Genre: Boxing, Drama
Streets of Gold is one of my favorite boxing movies of all time. It’s obviously not a filmmaking masterpiece in any sense of the word, but I really enjoyed the gritty nature of the story along with the characters of the two up and coming local boxers from Coney Island & the Gravesend section of Brooklyn being trained by the Mr. Miyagi version of boxing from the Soviet Union! Alek Neuman (Klaus Maria Brandauer) is a jewish immigrant from the USSR who was a former boxing champion that was not allowed on the Russian national team because he was a jew. Alek would soon defect from his home country in hopes of better pastures in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn which has a large population of residents from the Soviet Republic. He struggles day to day working as a dishwasher in a restaurant while drowning his past sorrows with mr vodka. Alek had a funny line in the movie: “In Russia I lived like an american and in America, I live like a russian”.
Alek stumbles onto an underground fighting circuit where he sees boxers fight such as Roland Jenkins (Wesley Snipes), a jive talking, street smart local champion from Coney Island with a tremendous upside and Timmy (Adrian Pasdar), a raw & brute talent from the nearby Gravesend section. These kids will eventually seek out the Miyagi like boxing technician to help train them after they’ve seen how gracefully a drunk Alek handled himself vs the cocky & heavy handed Wesley Snipes! The U.S.A. boxing team will eventually get wind of these NYC talents and covet them on their team much to the delight of Alek! A bout with the Russian national team will harden the stool for an intense encounter with Alek’s old coach. Some beer muscles will make a presence as it would inspire additional twists to the hips while celebrating at the neighborhood restaurant on Brighton Beach.
There were a few ethnic slurs & derogatory words being tossed back and forth mostly involving the “N” word directed at Wesley Snipes’ character coming from a jealous & selfish hate monger. Despite a few ignorant creatures in the film, the brotherhood of boxing would be much more deeper than color, race, creed, & cultures. There were also no political or religious agendas being stirred up in the Streets of Gold as a black muslim, a jew, & a training brother preached comradery, loyalty and friendship till the end. The issue with the Russian national team being anti-semitic remained in the background without further air time until personalities met in the locker room. The actual fight in the ring was less about the russians vs the americans rather it was more about believing in yourself, the hard work & effort put forth, and your trust in the circle of friends that you surrounded yourself in.
I loved some of the views and backdrops of Coney Island from the 1980’s in this film including the boardwalk and Astroland Park!! It gave us a glimpse of that gritty old charm of NYC that we miss so much! I just wished some company would remaster this movie or at least put out a passable copy of Streets of Gold on DVD but for now, my trusty beat up VHS copy from Vestron via Tower Records clearance will have to suffice!
Tags: boxing, movies, mr c
Posted in movies, mr. c | Comments (2)
September 17th, 2011 at 5:04 pm
Dear god I had forgotten about this movie. It was a great little film from way back in my video store days….
September 20th, 2011 at 1:15 pm
I’ve been waiting patiently for a DVD release. Looks like it will never happen. Lots of good movies get lost in the VHS shuffle.