"Two-Fisted" is a very well written comedy. This movie is filled with great comic lines and a cast who knows how to deliver them. Hap Hurley (Lee Tracy) is the manager of boxer, Chick Moran (Roscoe Karns) whose boxing skills leave much to be desired. Chick misses a train, and therefore a scheduled boxing match, forcing Hap to shell out $50. to the fighter who won the match due to Chick's absence. Chick arrives late in a cab for which he has no money to pay the driver, and Hap is broke as well, despite Chick's promises to the driver of payment upon arrival. To prevent the cab driver from clobbering Chick with a monkey wrench for non-payment, as the driver declared was his credit system, Chick and Hap instead enter the cab, and tell the cab driver to drive on, as they try to think of ways to get out of this jam. By luck, when the cab gets a flat, Hap and Chick come upon a well dressed drunk who they were able to trick into paying the full cab fare for them. The drunk turns out to be a fellow named Clint Blackburn (Kent Taylor), a former boxer who invites the pair to his lavish home where he lives with his sister, Sue Parker (Gail Patrick). Sue is seeking a divorce from her husband, a rather obnoxious character referred to only as "Parker" in the film (Gordon Wescott). Sue fears that Parker is planning to kidnap their son, Jimmy (Billy Lee). Jimmy meets Hap & Chick when he finds them in his kitchen and tries to hold them at toy-gun point, mistaking the unfamiliar pair as robbers. Jimmy's nurse, Marie (Grace Bradley) is sure Jimmy was kidnapped when she finds he is not in his room. But he is found in the kitchen with a face full of chocolate cake, having already become fast friends with Hap and Chick. After a discussion with Clint & Sue, Chip and Hap are hired to manage the large home, to keep a protective eye on Jimmy, and to get Clint back in shape as a boxer, with the understanding that Clint can not go back to drinking. Parker visits the house to speak with his wife but is given "the business" by the new house managers, leaving Parker fuming. Hap trains young Jimmy to box and holds a boxing match between Jimmy and another young boy. The match is pretty much a real match between the two kids with real blows. (Kid boxing was popular in the 30's. This was young Billy Lee's second boxing movie in a row, the other being "The Silk Hat Kid" (1935), where the lead character is a mobster who reforms after a priest asks him to train some young boys to box. (A predecessor by a few years, of the style of the later 'Dead End Kids' movies.) In "Two-Fisted", young Jimmy loses his first match by a tko and demands a rematch. When Chick agrees to participate in an exhibition match in the home where he and Hap now work, as a special treat for guests at an upcoming party, he doesn't realize his opponent, whom he was told was just someone's driver, also happens to be a rather good professional boxer who intends to take the match seriously. Parker gets in on the action when he runs into a drunken Clint at the bar. Clint winds up betting $10,000 on Chick to win the upcoming bout. The day of the match finally comes and Chick is actually holding his own fairly well during the match, inspired by his new love interest, Jimmy's nurse, Marie, whom he fell in love with after defending her from Parker's seedy advances the day he was at the house. The match is just getting interesting when it is suddenly discovered that young Jimmy is missing from his bedroom! I won't spoil the ending. I highly recommend this film to everyone who enjoys a good comedy with a great cast portraying interesting characters from a well written script!
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