Mobsters and Boxers at CIFF

The Sugar Wars & A Fighting Heart

 “Is it a crime, to fight, for what is mine?” — Tupac Shakur

Clevelanders love stories that are about Cleveland. The Cleveland International Film Festival knows this and treats its city residents to the Local Heroes Competition. This year, the list was on the shorter side, yet CIFF made up for it by offering quality titles that resonated with a finicky crowd.

For very the first time, the CIFF played a double feature. On April 7, in two side-by-side theaters, the Festival ran The Sugar Wars: The Life Story of Angelo Lonardo and A Fighting Heart. Patrons chose the theater based on the Q&A they preferred afterwards, as one theater hosted the producers of Wars, while the other theater hosted the producers of Heart. Both theaters were packed, despite the Sunday night 9:30PM screen time.

The Sugar Wars tells the tale of the First Cleveland Mafia Family, the Lonardos. They arrived from Sicily, where political tensions and government instability paved the way for nefarious leadership. They chose Cleveland, with New York City and Chicago as its mobster bookends. And during prohibition, they controlled the booze. The sugar created from using corn (bountiful in the area) expedited booze creation by nearly a month, with a one-day turnaround process. This created a lucrative empire for the Shaker Heights family.

In a plot that blueprints The Godfather, there were family killings, vendettas and betrayals. A son avenges his father’s death. He disappears while the officials look for him. All the while, the strong matriarch keeps her bloodline in check and knows full well what pays for her lifestyle.

The film chronicles the criminals all the way to Danny Green (Kill the Irishman played at a previous CIFF) and to Rudy Giuliani, who as U.S. Attorney began to clean the mafia house. One of the most charming aspects of The Sugar Wars are the various interviews with locals who know the story well, because they lived it. The real gem is the interview with Lonardo, inter-spliced throughout the one-hour. The casualness with which the old man discusses the murders is simultaneously bone-chilling and comical. In the audience, you’re not quite sure if you should be laughing or be really, really afraid.

A Fighting Heart focuses on the story of Johnny Kilbane, a Cleveland boxer whose family made its way to N.E. Ohio from Ireland, specifically the Achill Island off the Irish West Coast. A significant migration occurred from there to here as Ohio was looking for strong men who could physically contribute to the robust growth in the area, especially for the building of the Erie Canal. Because life on Achill Island was already tough, due to the rocky terrain and little access to resources, this specific Irish population wasn’t afraid of the work and began to plant its roots here.

Kilbane knew he’d never be a millionaire doing this kind of labor. Inspired by a local friend who believed in him, Kilbane began to train and box. At the time, boxing was a sport of immigrants and not regulated the way it is today, so his first couple of fights ran way past twenty rounds and in the most claustrophobic and smokiest locations imagined. Despite his small frame, Kilbane continued to fight his way into the national circuit, earning a reputation and the money to support his wife and family.

The big turn of events happens with a certain Jewish boxer and up until recently the footage from that fight was thought long since gone. However, Frank Stallone located it, enabling that historical fight to be included in this very film. In fact, the entire documentary is almost a series of perfect accidents and coincidences. A Cleveland man begins to clean out his attic and discovers archives and memorabilia that, it turns out, belongs to his own family. He’s a direct descendent of Kilbane. He then contacts Des Kilbane, who just happens to be a filmmaker in Ireland. Des comes to Cleveland in the summer of 2012 and miraculously gets the best sunshine this city’s known, producing beautiful shots that help unveil the story. And, like the original Kilbane in the story, they all attribute it to “The Luck of the Irish.”

The most fascinating aspect of Heart is what happens to Kilbane the boxer after he loses all his money in the stock market crash of 1929 and how he rebuilds his life as a boxing teacher and, eventually, as a respectful member of the city’s court system. It’s no secret that our local judges have Irish names (many of which are the same), but as the film reveals, most of their ancestors also came from Achill, with the character toughness passed on from generation to generation.

On surface, Wars and Heart share the Cleveland geography. But, on closer look, the parallels of these two documentaries run far deeper. Both films tell the tales of turn-of-the-century European countries in states of chaos, propelling thick-skinned people to create better lives for themselves and their families. They risked the little they had for the uncertain and the unknown. The migrations arrived here in Cleveland, one group on the city’s near east side, one on the city’s near west. Each population had its own traditions and value system and had to simultaneously preserve those codes all the while integrating within what was still a young and unshaped country. The influence and pride of both groups is still felt wide here in Cleveland.

The big difference, of course, is that while Kilbane helped the lawmakers, Lonardo was a lawbreaker. Yet what each man wanted most was to provide for his family and know that they’d be taken care of. And that fighting spirit is what makes both stories so compelling and relateable. Because if you’re not going to fight for what you believe in, who will?

Reprinted with permission and gratitude from CoolCleveland.com.