Don’t Look for Reviewer to Take Jabs at This Film

READER BEWARE: In the interest of full disclosure, I am compelled to report that I am in the new Ron Shelton movie, “Play It to the Bone.” I am in it substantially less than the stars, Lolita Davidovich, Antonio Banderas and Woody Harrelson, but I have as many lines as Kevin Costner. I’m probably going to like a movie if I’m in it, especially if I’m paid.

*

This is not “Raging Bull” or “The Hurricane.” Like most of Shelton’s other sports movies, including “Bull Durham,” “White Men Can’t Jump” and “Tin Cup,” this one was intended primarily to entertain and succeeded.

I say that despite one scene that could be classified as documentary.

Discussing whether it would be possible for boxers played by Harrelson and Banderas to become ranked so they can get a title shot, Robert Wagner’s casino owner turns to his secretary, played by Jordy Oakland, and says, “I could get Julie here ranked with a phone call.”

It’s apparent that Shelton has been paying attention to the federal investigation into the International Boxing Federation.

It’s also apparent that Shelton, a former second baseman in the Baltimore Oriole organization, has as much appreciation for boxers as he had for minor league baseball players in “Bull Durham.”

Several boxers, including Art Aragon, Mando Ramos, Angel Manfreddy, Mia St. John, Johnny Tapia, Danny Romero Jr., Fernando Vargas and Sugar Ray Leonard, attended Monday night’s premiere at the El Capitan in Hollywood, and, to a man and woman, said that the fight scenes captured the experience.

Before the premiere, Shelton announced that the production company overseen by him and Stephen Chin, Shanghai’d Films, was donating $50,000 to the Retired Boxers Foundation and dedicated the movie to “everyone who ever fought on an undercard and wondered if anyone was paying attention.”

*

Boxing publicist Bill Caplan apparently was paying attention in 1965, when he watched a fight at the Hacienda in Las Vegas on a Sugar Ray Robinson undercard that turned out to be one of the most memorable he has seen.

It involved two Mexican fighters, best friends, who got the call in the L.A. gym where they were training and drove to Las Vegas to fight that night.

Caplan and late Times sports columnist Allan Malamud, to whom the film also is dedicated, told the story eight years ago to Shelton, who vowed to turn it into a movie.

Through a recent article in The Times, Caplan located one of the fighters, Polo Corona. The other, Pulga Serrano, died 10 years ago after being hit by a car in Tijuana.

“It’s like it was happening now,” said Corona, who relived the fight while watching it on the big screen. He didn’t know about the movie until he received a call at his home in Guymas in the Mexican state of Sonora, inviting him to the premiere. “We did this kind of fight.”

One difference, he noted, was that the fighters in the movie were each paid $50,000. Corona said that he and Serrano were each paid either $1,200 or $1,500. But they earned at least as much from the money tossed into the ring after the fight by appreciative spectators.

Corona and Serrano never fought each other again. Corona said they remained close for several more years until they lost contact after returning to Mexico in the 1980s. He said he didn’t know his friend had died until Monday night, when Serrano’s son, Enrique Zamora of Los Angeles, told him.

Although it’s unclear in the movie, Corona said he wants everyone to know that he is the one portrayed by Banderas.

*

The next morning, I went to a news conference in West Hollywood for “Sugar” Shane Mosley. I’ve liked him since his amateur days in Pomona and often thought that he was unfairly overlooked by local media that favor Oscar De La Hoya and, to a lesser extent, Vargas, despite declarations from experts such as Larry Merchant, who says, “To me, Shane is the most thrilling fighter out there.”

The stars appeared to finally align for Mosley when negotiations for the De La Hoya-Felix Trinidad rematch began to unravel. Staples Center reportedly offered a generous site fee to match De La Hoya and Mosley in June.

But Mosley, who will fight Willy Wise in Las Vegas on Jan. 22, didn’t refer to that Tuesday. He instead talked about fighting in Hong Kong in February, meeting Trinidad in June and then seeing whether De La Hoya is available in September.

Meantime, Mosley’s New York promoter was calling him “the best fighter in Southern California.” I thought Mosley was eager to prove that in the ring. Now he wants to be coy, negotiate, make De La Hoya come to him.

That doesn’t make him different from anyone else in professional boxing, but I thought he was different. I’m constantly reminded why I prefer boxing in the movies.

Randy Harvey can be reached at his e-mail address: randy.harvey@latimes.com.