The Basketball Fix

Ripped from the Headlines the Ads used to Say in the Day. This Little B-Movie Capitalized on Just That.

A Real-Life Scandal Shocked College Basketball and its Fans During the Early 50's.

The Sacrosanct Higher-Education System Took a Hit of Sorts as a Light was Shined on some "Dark-Dirty-Play".

Still Alive Today.

The Debate about Big-Money in College Sports as Amateur (by Law) Athletes are Exploited for Their Skills with No Financial Reward.

Sure some of the Top in the Field Get Scholarships Worth Money, but Not All the Player Get a "Full-Ride" and the Inequities are Transparent.

This Movie is Helped by the Versatile John Ireland as a Sports Journalist and Felix Feist, a Workman-Like Director.

Marshall Thompson Plays the B-Ball "Star" who Goes from High-School to College.

Maintaining a "Boy-Scout" Clean-Cut Life Sinking Baskets and Dominating the Game.

He also has Issues at Home Taking Care of a Younger Brother with Little Resources.

So No Christmas Toys for the Kid, and No Money to Solidify His Love with a "Diamond Ring", the "Shooter" Buckles and Deliberately Misses, for a Pay-Day from the "Mob"

Once Hooked, He's in it Forever.

The Production Code No-No's are Avoided and the Story is Told in a Rather White-Washed Display.

But Close Enough for the Strange and Off-Beat Foray into a Touchy Thing that Movies Generally Stayed Clear.

Worth a Watch.

John Ireland is a sports reporter for a paper. He went to college on a basketball scholarship, and his old coach asks him to check out a local kid kid him. Marshall Thompson is a great prospect, and he's flattered to be asked, but he has to stay in town. He's got a sick father, so he needs to work side jobs to help out. So he goes to a local college and works side jobs.... and takes money to shave points.

It's a nice little exposé, with some organized crime and small town footage, to give it the sort of appeal that a B picture needed on the rapidly fading States Rights circuit. Director Felix Feist may have picked up an Oscar for telling Robert Benchley to sit at a desk and sound confused, but he was a B director at heart, able to get a decent movie on a tiny budget, and that's what he does here.

The plot was decent - kind of a Mickey Rooney "Quicksand" on the basketball court, instead of a car dealership.

I guess they needed a babyface Marshall Thompson to play Johnny Long but it's a shame that they couldn't have found someone who looked like they actually knew how to play the game.

Maybe the make-up department could have done something with Chuck Connors, only 4 years older than Thompson, as he played for the Celtics after he returned from serving in WWII.

Newspaper sports columnist John Ireland (as Pete Ferreday) finds mature-looking basketball player Marshall Thompson (as Johnny Long) in a high school locker room. With his father in a sanitarium, Mr. Thompson must work to support himself and little brother Bobby Hyatt (as Mickey); possibly, school officials were unaware of this living arrangement. After Mr. Ireland helps the young man win a scholarship, Thompson becomes a college freshman star athlete. Working at a swanky country club, Thompson meets curvy Vanessa Brown (as Pat Judd), and the two are quickly engaged. Still strapped for cash, Thompson is tempted by wealthy William Bishop (as Mike Taft), who pays players to "fix" game points.

"The Basketball Fix" doesn't look "Digitally Remastered," as is claimed on the present DVD releases; the picture is acceptable, but not sharp. The synopsis states, "This noir-ish film, expertly directed by Felix Feist, documents events that seem commonplace today, but were scandalous at the time of the film's original release." You might think a player like Thompson's "Johnny Long" would be satisfied with the millions of dollars he would make today, but perhaps not. And, the film doesn't really resemble a "film noir". It is a typical story about a sports youth being tempted by gangsters, but done in the style and structure of the recently successful "Sunset Boulevard" (1950), with Ireland channeling William Holden.

***** The Basketball Fix (8/51) Felix Feist ~ John Ireland, Marshall Thompson, Vanessa Brown, William Bishop

Sitting in a bar all by himself sports writer Pete Farreday, John Ireland,is approached by a reporter, Johnny Phillips, with a photo of a number of college students arrested for being involved in a mob-fix of basketball games that they played in. Asking at first for the reporter to please not print that photo after Pete ripped it up, when the reporter refused, Pete let him have it with a left to the jaw.

Pete had a very personal interest in the story that the reporter was talking about and as the movie goes into flashback and we in the audience get to see what happened to get Pete so emotional about it. Johnny Long, Marshall Thompson, is a good student and even better basketball player on the Central High School team. Wanting to go to a college close to where he lived with his kid brother Mickey, Bobby Hyatt, who Johnny was supporting, as well as himself. At his job as a valet at the Cresthaven Country Club Johnny turned down a number of basketball scholarships from colleges out of the area.

Pete got to know Johny well and was also a good friend of the local college ,State College, basketball coach Nat Becker, Walter Sande, who got Johnny in the college where he quickly became the star player and was leading the State College basketball team to the local as well as country-wide championship. While Johnny was working at the Cresthaven Club he met mob bookie Mike Taft ,William Bishop, who was interested in Johnny not for his hard work and ethics on and off the basketball court but for what he Johnny could do for him and the mob that he works with. Taft was interested in making a lot of cash for the mob and himself by throwing Johnny a few scraps for playing along with him, in shaving points.

A "See it now straight from the headlines" type movie that was obviously made to capitalize on the CCNY, among other, college point-shaving scandal that rocked the world of college sports back in the early 1950's. With John Ireland playing a hard hitting, with his fists as well as his typewriter keys, sports columnist who's for college athletes getting compensated by their schools in order to counter-balance the temptations that they are faced with, like Johnny, by mobsters like Mike Taft.

Made an impact back then,1951,on the public but watching the movie now it's no big deal compared to the corruption and abuse in the sports world, both professional and college, that we see now. We see at first Johnny strongly rejecting cash from Taft for purposely missing points in games that he and the mob are betting on. Later, when Johnnies financial troubles become unbearable he gives in to mobsters and thus destroys a promising career in both college and professional basketball.

Johnny also, by being busted, loses his girl who he was engaged to marry Pat, Vanessa Brown, and that ironically was the reason that he was busted in the first place. Johnny foolishly paid $1,000.00 in cash, that he got from Taft, for an engagement ring for Pat giving a false name but having the right initials carved into the ring. Johnny being a big college star was easily recognized by the Jewelry salesman, Lester Shape, who got in touch with the press and thus Johnnies fate was sealed. In the end Johnny Long learned the hard way what he never would learn in college. That when you get in with "The Mob" there's no way of getting out except in a pine box or prison cell.