Knockout

World-heavyweight-champion-boxer Max Schmeling shines in Knock-Out, a delightful musical-comedy drama that also stars Schmeling's wife, Czech actress Anny Ondra. Schmeling portrays chief electrician Max Breuer in a Berlin revue theatre. When a fellow employee objects to Breuer's interest in Marianne (Ondra), Breuer knocks him senseless in a wildly hilarious melee amidst a chorus-line boxing routine. Breuer meets a fight manager played by Otto Wernicke and is signed as a prize fighter. The training sequences are impressively and realistically staged. Breuer is lured away by a rival manager, who bills him under a pseudonym-none other than Max Schmeling!-and sends him to challenge the Irish champion. Will Schmeling prevail and win the fight? The vehicle is tailored to Schmeling's fame, as evidenced by the chorus girls performing a musical boxing parody that is as well-choreographed as it is amusing. Anny Ondra's comedic skills are charming, but it is her husband's picture, even though she received top billing. Schmeling was craftily exploited by Dr. Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry as a cinematic emblem of Aryan supremacy.