Titanes en el Ring 1973

 





What happens when 1980’s WWF wrestling and Mexican Lucha Libre are both kind of jumbled together? The result ends up being the Argentine version from the 1960-1980’s called Titanes en el ring or Titans in the ring. They had a television show, did some Latin American tours, had toys and trading cards, weird and unusual characters, and made two feature length films: Titanes en el Ring in 1973 and Titanes en el Ring contrataca in 1984. Martin Karadagian would be considered the Hulk Hogan of the group; he was often the world champion, regularly appeared on the television show, and was the main star out of the wrestlers in the movies.

It’s hard to really call it a film because it’s basically just several wrestling shows filmed, with a very weak storyline pieced in between those shows. The plot involves a young boy that is a fan and his father promises to buy him tickets to the shows as long as he keeps doing well in school. He lies to this girl that he likes, to impress her of course, and tells her that he knows the Titans and will introduce them to her if she comes to the show with him. Let’s get out of the way what bothers me with this whole boy and girl relationship deal in this story, they are way too young to even be doing this. They’re essentially dating. And the problem is that they are seriously way too young in this, we’re talking somewhere between 7 and 10 years old. It’s really weird. After the first wrestling match/date, they have a conversation that the girl brings up about how they are in a relationship. So that’s the bulk of the story pretty much until the end of the movie.

Let’s pull a Quentin Tarantino and back up a bit, pretend there are some episodic title cards on the screen that say “Chapter 2. Opening Credits.” You can tell that the film and television show are geared towards kids, because the opening them song sounds like something from a cartoon or kids show. I don’t know what they’re saying because that part was subtitled, but you can tell that its light hearted.  The film opens up with all of the wrestlers training and already you can tell that there are some interesting characters. They used the term lucha libre or parts of it through the film, but there are only several masked wrestlers seen in the film. In the training, we see them perform various moves such as arm drags, drop kicks, kip ups, flips, collar and elbow tie ups, and other moves I couldn’t give a name for or have time to. There’s a lot going on in these scenes, with most of the wrestlers inside a ring and the camera being several feet outside of it. One funny thing that I noticed on second viewing is that one of the wrestlers is smoking a cigar while training with another wrestler, how hilarious is that.

So fast forward to the first night of wrestling that the boy and girl attend and it’s a long one, featuring eleven matches. I’ve went back and forth on how to present this and I feel that my slightly above average note taking can provide a little about each match, unfortunately I was always able to tell who was who character wise. These groups of matches are all very fast paced, short, heavily clipped, and mix in shots of the crowd and the boy and girl. The first match is Jose Luis versus Italian something (I couldn’t catch a full name), both wore black wrestling singlets and there were tons of flying head scissors, and a flip over the guys head to a roll up for the win. The second match was a pair of hippies versus Ivanoff the Gypsy, who also wore a black singlet. One hippie wore all red leather and looked more heavy metal than hippie. There were lots of drop kicks, flying head scissors, and the Gypsy body slammed one hippie onto the other and pinned them both.

The third match was Ararat versus Pedro Goitia, with both wearing black singlets but one was heavy and looked exactly like Gorilla Monsoon when he used to wrestle. There were a lot of body slams and a few monkey flip with the Monsoon lookalike winning. The fourth match was Israeli Champ Tanenbaum versus the Caveman, who actually looked like a caveman while the other guy had a black singlet. They must have gotten a sweet deal on black singlet because almost everyone is wearing them. There was a double kick to the face, some drop kicks, and a roll up for the Israeli win. The fifth match was Silvio the Italian versus Joe the Mercenary; with Silvio wearing a red shirt, black sash, and beige pants, and you just guess the other one without me repeating it. There are some punches and kicks, chops, and a ref toss after the match. The sixth match was Silvio the Italian versus Soon the Korean, with the Korean wearing a gi and the other guy with a black singlet again. I hope they at least own their own and aren’t switching in the back. There is a dropkick and a splash in this match for the pin.

The seventh match is one of the big ones because they give extra time and show the entrance, it’s Yolanca versus Tufic Memet. Yolanca comes floating down in a silver space ship and clear fish bowl helmet; he’s in all yellow with patched areas of around and has a mask. The kids have flags they are waving with his name on it. Memet has the dreaded black singlet, but did enter wearing a turban. There was a flying head scissors, some kicks and punches, and then a botched roll up for the win. The eight match is the Red Knight versus Ulysses the Greek. The Red Knight is a luchadore dress all in red and came out to entrance music and kissed a kid in the ring. Is that weird? He is taking on a guy with just a one arm black singlet, who did come out wearing a red jacket. There is a full nelson, reversal, running the ropes, hip toss multiple times, arm drag off the top rope, and some other moves that I would have to look up to name. It was the longest and best match highlights and ended up being declared a draw.

The ninth match is Cucumber the Clown versus The Viking. The clown is in a patched, multi colored clown suit and the Viking is in black with fur boots. There are some drop kicks and a rope tie up, with someone called super kid (who had his own them music) coming in to help the clown. The tenth match is Puechele the Thick versus Il Comendattore Benito Durante, with both wearing black singlets except the more muscular guy has a thinner one. There is a powerbomb backbreaker and the match is cut away without a finish. The final match is the Mummy versus Martin Karadagian. The mummy gets a huge entrance with music, walking out slowly. His mouth is covered with clothe also and he is able to do a creepy breathing thing, where the fabric sucks in and out of his mouth. The top guy Karadagian wears a black singlet with black tights. There are lots of punches and the mummy tries to choke him most of the time, there ends up being blood and they call the match a draw.

So this is the point where they have the relationship talk and he leaves he house and there is always a red car with its hood up across the street. There is another training sequence with the wrestlers and then another show, this time only showing two matches; one involving the hippies and Ararat versus Sancho Panzo and the Knight, and one involving Red Knight and Cucumber the Clown versus Karadagian and Durante. The knight is something that has to be mentioned, he wears an all silver cloth outfit that looks like its medieval battle armor.

Chapter 5. The Birthday Party. I’m thinking about right now that I should’ve gone all out Tarantino and started with the end of the movie. Or maybe even one step further, by borrowing elements from other writing and incorporate it into this. “We're all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn't. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing” [1]. So the little girl is having clowns at her birthday party, hoorah! They are somewhat creepy, but aren’t all of them? These two clowns play instruments, trombone and clarinet. Then it switches to boy band time, as some Argentine pop band plays and gets the kids to dance. All of this once again brings up the question, should you be in a relationship when the person you’re dating has clowns at their birthday party.

After the party is over, the boy is home asleep and has a nightmare about all of the titans fighting each other in a bar brawl. They don’t go to wrestling this time, instead watching it on television because the girl is sick. The mummy gets some more stage time and wins his match.

The infinite finality of being. This is the point in the story where the boy and girl get to meet the wrestlers while they are training and have lunch with Karadagian. They want to meet the mummy and he tells them that he is sleeping and takes them to see him, but they must be quiet. He’s in the locker room, standing up sleeping in between some lockers. He slowly starts to shake his hands and do the creepy breathing thing and they quickly leave. While at lunch, Karadagian tells them the story of how the Titans came to become a wrestling organization. There were the good guys and the bad guys and they were all together and an argument happened between two that resulted in all of them fighting. Once they were tired, they decided to join up and forget about the past. And so ended their lunch and visit together.

“I remember the time I was kidnapped and they sent a piece of my finger to my father. He said he wanted more proof” [2]. The red car finally makes sense, even though it made for a weak subplot. The boy and girl return back to her home and her father is kidnapped by a group of three thugs in a red car. The boy enlists the help of the Titans and they find the house where he is being held and unleash some ass kicking upon thine enemies. Now some of the thugs have guns and could’ve shot them at any point but let’s just let that slide, besides it’s a kid’s movie. We can’t have their version Hulk Hogan getting killed. Besides, the Mummy makes his grand entrance to eliminate the gunmen, coming out from some large bushes and then disappearing back once done.  The dad ends up getting saved and everyone is happy and, the end.

If you are a hardcore wrestling fan that has seen and enjoyed the Mexican lucha libre movies with Santo, then this is something you have watch for morbid curiosity more than anything else. I wouldn’t even call what was there a plot, but they have some crazy hilarious characters worth seeing. And they made the Mummy seem cool as hell. If anything, he is what’s worth checking out on this one.