Drath pulls no punches in new HBO documentary.

Drath pulls no punches in new HBO documentary.

By Mike Cassell 7/20/09

I almost half expected the new HBO documentary “Assault in the ring” produced and directed by Eric Drath, to be an apprehensive possibly “watered down” expose of the events that transpired in and out of the ring on June 16^th 1983 in Madison Square Garden. On that night undefeated highly touted prospect, Irish Billy Collins Jr. suffered a horrific beating and ten round decision lost at the tainted hands of the underdog and journeyman fighter Luis Resto. The amount of damage inflicted on the face of Billy Collins Jr. was quite frankly hard to look at. Shortly after the upset, when Resto walked over to the corner of Collins Jr. to show his good sportsmanship, Billy Collins Sr. reached out and grabbed one of Resto’s gloves. What he discovered would become recognized as one of the most despicable acts of unsportsmanlike like conduct in the history of the already scarred sport of boxing. The padding in Resto’s gloves just didn’t seem to be there.  Collins Sr. went ballistic before television cameras, demanding the gloves be confiscated immediately. Resto’s reaction was captured in real time, and seemed to tell its own story. That’s the part that viewers in the Garden and at home witnessed, but there was a broader more tangled web of lies, betrayal and manipulation that director Eric Drath and HBO bravely took on.

After the loss, Billy Collins Jr. suffered from a torn iris and blurred vision that seemingly ended his professional career. That one night in the Garden transformed the young undefeated hopeful, into a bitter angry man prone to violence mood swings. In 1984, after losing two jobs in a short period, and not being able to fight, he fell harder and faster into drugs and alcohol. On March 6, of that same year he careened of the road and into a ditch near his home in Antioch, Tennessee; a suburb of Nashville. He was killed on impact. Collins was just 22 years old. In 1986, trainer Panama Lewis and Luis Resto were both put on trial and found guilty of assault, and criminal possession of a weapon (Resto's fists) along with conspiracy. Prosecutors charged that the bout amounted to assault with a deadly weapon on Billy Collins Jr. Resto and Lewis were sentenced to 7 years but both served 2.5 years in prison. Panama Lewis and Luis Resto were barred from the sport of boxing for life. Most believed Resto was railroaded and manipulated by the likes of Panama Lewis, the man he was supposed to trust and still makes a fine living as a trainer today. Producer and director Eric Drath found that Resto was living rent-free in the basement of the Morris Park Boxing Gym in the Bronx. He was curious about the Billy Collins fight and the events that took place back in 1983.

Resto, a seemingly quiet soft spoken man took Drath through a dark passage, talking of the night of the fight and his dismal journey afterward. There was plenty of blame to go around. Of course there was the New York State boxing commission, and the promoters, but Drath chose to go directly to the source, Luis Resto himself. This documentary brilliantly displays the vulnerability of a professional fighter and of Resto the man. Drath captured the moment and feeling of redemption as Resto finally came clean about what happened that night. You want to hate Resto, but you just can’t. He lost everything for his part in 1983. His career, his wife, and his 2 son’s who he barely knew, but defend him until the end on camera. It makes you think about Luis Resto the man, not the fighter. How can his family defend a husband that humiliated them? A father who was in prison, and so caught up in his own misery, became a virtual stranger to them? But yet they do, and so did I. I wanted to forgive Luis Resto for his role in the misery he caused, because it was obvious that he was just a pawn. Resto was an uneducated, poor Puerto Rican kid from the Bronx who was used so other men controlling him could profit.

The interaction on camera between Resto and his former trainer Panama Lewis tells the full story. Resto, a proud, very tough looking man, becomes a child in presence of Lewis. It was amazing to witness the power Lewis still had over this man now in his early fifties. You can only imagine the influence Lewis must have had over a younger, hungrier Luis Resto that fateful night in June 1983. Drath may have started out in the direction of clearing Resto’s name, but he inadvertently exposed a side of the sweet science that is rarely seen. It needed to be told, it needed to be seen, but most importantly, it needed to be said. And Luis Resto is the only man alive who could have said it. This Documentary is full of so many revelations, and it needs to be seen to be believed. It debuts on HBO Saturday August 1^st. If you can’t be home, set your DVR. This is one of the most honest boxing documentaries ever made, kudos to HBO for having the nerve to air it.