How many boxing movies can you think of that were utter flops? Hope in hell right? Think as hard and as far back as you may want to. But the stores of the Rocky Balboas of the world and the Reuben “Hurricane” Carters of the world and the Jake La Mota’s of the world make every single hair on your body stand up and take notice. Surely there are a zillion such stories about boxing and boxers but very few which make it to the silver screen. What you can be assured of in Hollywood is that a movie with boxing is what we call here as a “Formula” movie. And so we are now presented with the story of “Irish” Mickey Ward from the small town of Lowell, Massachusetts and his road to fame from extremely backward and not just humble beginnings. True Oscar fodder. Superb use of “Formula”. But backed with tremendous execution capabilities. Lets take a quick look at the story first.
Dicky Eklund Jr. (Christian Bale – and an extremely frail Christian Bale at that) is a crack addict par excellence. His claim to fame other than being in the running for the crack champion of the world is that he once knocked out Sugar Ray Leonard. This was way back in 1978. The debate which started then, continues to date. Did Sugar Ray actually get knocked out or did he trip. There are subscribers to both versions of the story. However, when Dicky dear doesn’t make it to too far in the world of boxing, crack comes along and becomes his crutch, along with that ever faithful friend of crack called alcohol. Combining forces, they ensure that Dicky moves on his way downhill despite the best wishes of his mother Alice (Melissa Leo) who goes by the 2nd name of Ward after she married George Ward (Jack McGee). Alice has tremendous patience I must say coz after having 7 children from her first marriage, she chose to have 2 more from her 2nd. Mickey Ward (Mark Wahlberg) is Dicky’s half brother and a solid boxer at that. Both Alice and Dicky are hell bent on ensuring that Mickey makes a career out of boxing. Probably out of an unfulfilled aspiration. But as manager and trainer respectively their efforts leave a lot to be desired. When Dicky gets jailed for assaulting a cop amongst other offences, Mickey decides that it is time to move on. And so when a sponsor presents himself, he decides to go into full time training and is also persuaded by his girlfriend Charlene Fleming (Amy Adams) to not get Alice and Dicky involved anymore in his boxing.
The Fighter is yet another movie that gives us hope. Truly one which has followed the footsteps of its predecessor. Did it have it to emulate Rocky? Not really. But what it did have is the presence of either Melissa Leo or Christian Bale in almost every frame. Made me wonder half way down the movie if both of them should have been nominated for the lead role and not the supporting role. And let me tell you that if they had been nominated for the lead, Colin Firth and Natalie Portman would have been left sucking their thumbs. In what can be considered as one of THE finest examples of method acting, Bale and Leo keep the audience rooted to their seats. One begins to feel sorry for Mark Wahlberg especially because try as hard as he may, he could not and probably cannot take his performance to the level of Bale in this movie. I also felt that the character of Dicky Eklund is just so much stronger for the screen than that of Mickey Ward – with no disrespect meant to Ward in any ways. Eklund just gave Christian Bale the right fodder to take his acting status from average to superb overnight.
I haven’t spoken about one of my favourite actors yet but much as I am totally in love with Amy Adams (like I am with several other actresses) I think this was a performance that was just above her par level. Superb but not brilliant like she was in Doubt or for that matter even Julie & Julia. Maybe it was also the content and screen time that leads me to give this view. Rounding off with direction which was overall quite solid from David O Russel. Probably his best to date. But could have been cut a little better and therefore got it down to around 2 hours. Nearly 2.5 hours is a little stretch. Overall, I give this 7 on 10 but a clear 9 on 10 t both Bale and Leo. Watch it for them if not anything else.
Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2330986777/
Dicky Eklund Jr. (Christian Bale – and an extremely frail Christian Bale at that) is a crack addict par excellence. His claim to fame other than being in the running for the crack champion of the world is that he once knocked out Sugar Ray Leonard. This was way back in 1978. The debate which started then, continues to date. Did Sugar Ray actually get knocked out or did he trip. There are subscribers to both versions of the story. However, when Dicky dear doesn’t make it to too far in the world of boxing, crack comes along and becomes his crutch, along with that ever faithful friend of crack called alcohol. Combining forces, they ensure that Dicky moves on his way downhill despite the best wishes of his mother Alice (Melissa Leo) who goes by the 2nd name of Ward after she married George Ward (Jack McGee). Alice has tremendous patience I must say coz after having 7 children from her first marriage, she chose to have 2 more from her 2nd. Mickey Ward (Mark Wahlberg) is Dicky’s half brother and a solid boxer at that. Both Alice and Dicky are hell bent on ensuring that Mickey makes a career out of boxing. Probably out of an unfulfilled aspiration. But as manager and trainer respectively their efforts leave a lot to be desired. When Dicky gets jailed for assaulting a cop amongst other offences, Mickey decides that it is time to move on. And so when a sponsor presents himself, he decides to go into full time training and is also persuaded by his girlfriend Charlene Fleming (Amy Adams) to not get Alice and Dicky involved anymore in his boxing.
The Fighter is yet another movie that gives us hope. Truly one which has followed the footsteps of its predecessor. Did it have it to emulate Rocky? Not really. But what it did have is the presence of either Melissa Leo or Christian Bale in almost every frame. Made me wonder half way down the movie if both of them should have been nominated for the lead role and not the supporting role. And let me tell you that if they had been nominated for the lead, Colin Firth and Natalie Portman would have been left sucking their thumbs. In what can be considered as one of THE finest examples of method acting, Bale and Leo keep the audience rooted to their seats. One begins to feel sorry for Mark Wahlberg especially because try as hard as he may, he could not and probably cannot take his performance to the level of Bale in this movie. I also felt that the character of Dicky Eklund is just so much stronger for the screen than that of Mickey Ward – with no disrespect meant to Ward in any ways. Eklund just gave Christian Bale the right fodder to take his acting status from average to superb overnight.
I haven’t spoken about one of my favourite actors yet but much as I am totally in love with Amy Adams (like I am with several other actresses) I think this was a performance that was just above her par level. Superb but not brilliant like she was in Doubt or for that matter even Julie & Julia. Maybe it was also the content and screen time that leads me to give this view. Rounding off with direction which was overall quite solid from David O Russel. Probably his best to date. But could have been cut a little better and therefore got it down to around 2 hours. Nearly 2.5 hours is a little stretch. Overall, I give this 7 on 10 but a clear 9 on 10 t both Bale and Leo. Watch it for them if not anything else.
Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2330986777/
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