I finally got around to watching The Fighter
Based very loosely on the story of Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg), a boxer from Lowell who made a somewhat improbable comeback in his 30s after a hiatus from the sport, becoming the WBU light welterweight champion, at which point the film ends. (I know zilch about boxing, as you probably guessed.) Ward’s brother and part-time trainer, Dick Eklund (Christian Bale), was also a professional boxer whose career ended due to cocaine addiction and ended up in jail for armed robbery. The film melodramatizes their relationship, moving around several events in the timeline to heighten the tension, while also folding in their crazy mother, played by Melissa Leo, and Ward’s girlfriend Charlene (Adams), who provides him with some stability and common sense. In an inspired move by the directors, Ward’s other trainer, Mickey O’Keefe, is played by … Mickey O’Keefe himself, well enough that it never occurred to me that he wasn’t a professional actor.
The film itself is a tight but rather generic underdog sports film, where Ward gets beaten down in the ring and out of it, quitting boxing and eventually having his hand broken in a fight with police where he’s defending his idiot brother (which I don’t think ever actually happened). With Dick in jail, Micky throws off the deadweight of him and his mother, rededicates himself to training, and ends up winning several fights, one of which comes after some advice from a still-imprisoned Dick. The curve of the narrative is so smooth that I felt like I was being played.
But the performances are really out of sight. Bale and Leo won Oscars for Best Supporting Actor and Actress; Bale’s was a pretty easy call, but I thought Leo largely won because of her accent and look, with Adams delivering an equally strong but more nuanced performance. There’s a great scene where she and Micky are about to have a little afternoon delight – with a shot of her in black lingerie that is absolutely there because, hey, Amy Adams in black lingerie sounds great – that culminates with Adams beating the crap out of one of Micky’s twenty-nine sisters on the porch of the house where she lives; Charlene is tough, independent (which grates on Micky’s family), but guarded, and doesn’t have the same over-the-top I’m-so-wicked-local veneer as Leo’s portrayal of Alice as a scheming, white-trashy woman who sees Micky as a paycheck and Dick as a misunderstood kid, not as an addict, thief, and anchor on his brother. Wahlberg plays the title role but is so understated next to the manic Bale that he’s overshadowed, but a similarly ebullient character would have made the film unwatchable (never mind whether it would have been realistic).
Again, I don’t follow boxing or even remotely like the sport, but one thing I noticed was that the boxing scenes looked somewhat realistic – the punches looked like they were landing, as opposed to the standard “wow, he really made contact with that pocket of air” technique. I’m sure some of the boxing scenes were glamorized, and real fans of the sweet science could probably pick them apart (please do – I’m curious), but at least the makers of the film made an effort to make the fight scenes watchable to the non-fan.
And, because everyone loves a ranking, here are the Best Picture nominees from 2011, in one non-critic’s opinion, with links to my reviews of seven of them.
1. Winter’s Bone
2. The King’s Speech
3. The Social Network
4. Toy Story 3
5. True Grit
6. Inception
7. The Fighter
8. Black Swan
9. The Kids Are All Right
10. Sorry, I’m just not watching it.
Of course, those aren’t the best films of 2010, but it seemed like a good enough place to start. I have heard raves about Animal Kingdom, so that’s in the queue.
Keith: just curious, why do you dislike James Franco? I actually really liked 127 hours, but I don’t have much exposure to him outside of that.
“…tight but rather generic”: perfectly put. Well done all around, yes, but ultimately it didn’t succeed at anything beyond entertaining me. I think The Town compares very favorably with The Fighter; I was shocked at how much i enjoyed the former.
Also, I’m in fervent agreement with you on your overall #1. Winter’s Bone was phenomenal.
I’m from Chelmsford, and the police actually did break his hand. The details in the film are pretty accurate. I saw the movie for the first time with my friends father, who was a lowell drug cop at the time (like you, I assumed it was made-up). He verified in went fairly close to that, and also that his mother really was exactly like that. You should also watch High on Crack Street, the documentary they were filming in the movie.
The punches looked like they were landing, well, because they were: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/fighter-s-mark-wahlberg-filming-59089
From a real life story standpoint, the movie didn’t show any of Ward’s fights with Gatti, which are some of the best fights of the 2000s.
@ Ian
I would consider “The Town” a good movie. If it weren’t for the fact that the entire script was essentially a rip off from “Heat.”
Just curious….
“(I’m not watching 127 Hours, because I can’t stand James Franco, and that movie is basically him.)”
Why?
Pretty much agree with you on the review. As a big boxing fan, and a big Micky Ward fan, I just wanted to point out a few things that really bugged me about the movie.
1. They change the weight at which Micky fights. I don’t understand why, unless they didn’t think the public would buy that Marky Mark could make 140 pounds.
2. The added fictional fights to the movie that had absolutely NOTHING to do with the plot. The guys they list during the little 3 fight run where he cements himself as a contender are not real. He had fights during that period, so why the heck randomly change it? Just annoyed me.
3. They really overexaggerated the size difference he went up against in the fight he loses.
But, I love boxing movies and this was a pretty good one. Bale is an extremely versatile actor, Adams is a very good actress, and Marky Mark was above average.
I’ve seen Franco in three things. One was in Spiderman, where he showed me he couldn’t act. The second was last year’s Oscars, where he just acted like an idiot. And the third, courtesy of my wife, is on General Hospital, where he plays a homicidal avant-garde artist named – wait for it – Franco. And he is awful, even on a show that isn’t exactly Shakespeare in the Park.
Mike: Interesting. I read up on the story before writing this, and was under the impression his hand was hurt in the ring, not outside of it. High on Crack Street is supposed to be excellent (e.g., per this 2011 review) but the site that was hosting it online has taken it down.
According to the undisputed Wikipedia, the hand injuries were a result of boxing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micky_Ward
Did you watch through the end credits? When they show the real Dickey, it makes Bale’s performance all the more impressive.
He hurt it several times in the ring after the police incident, because he would never let it heal. He would wait just long for medical clearance, and then take another fight
Mike– I believe that. Hand injuries are chronic once they happen with boxers. Especially ones who just throw power punches.
So then they screwed with the timeline even more than I thought, right?
Yep. I know it’s a movie, and Micky Ward is a pretty average boxer when all is said and done, but the lack of authenticity was a little disappointing when I had previously read how authentic Marky Mark had wanted to make The Fighter. Having Ward and Eklund on hand the whole time makes it worse.
That I couldn’t tell you. The stuff about his hand came from my friend’s father. I didn’t pay much attention to Mickey until the Gatti fights
Also, Mickey’s a wreck now. I see him every once in a while, usually at the chinese restaurant in Chelmsford, and he’s generally drunk.
Another fun fact, there was no female to help Dickie roll johns. He would go with the men, then rob them, thinking that they wouldn’t report it because they wouldn’t want people to know they were gay
That’s sad to hear about Micky. Seems to happen to so many former athletes and boxers in particular. I thought he had his s— together after seeing how his brother was, but I guess not. Sucks that the two guys in 3 of the greatest fights ever are both messed up. Gatti dead — either by his wife’s hand or his own — and Mickey suffering from substance abuse.
Also from Chelmsford, coincidentally, though I don’t live there anymore. Can’t tell you how hard my sister and I laughed at the “What are we doing in richy-rich Lexington” line.
As to Melissa Leo, while she was fine (all the accents really were spot-on for Lowell, even if the sisters’ attitudes were over the top), I think she paled in comparison to Dale Dickey in Winter’s Bone for the “terrifying local of the year” award. I know it wasn’t a huge role, but Dickey was amazing as the woman who Lawrence has to get through to find her father — much more versatile than Leo in a much more complex role.
And on 127 Hours, you’re not missing much. There’s way too much of Danny Boyle’s tricky camera shots and hyperactivity for a movie that’s supposed to drive home how lonely and unrelenting something was. And the biggest offenders on that count were not things that actually happened to Aron, while one of the most powerful things that happened was changed to something less compelling for no apparent reason.
On the other hand, James Franco’s stubble could easily have been nominated for best supporting actor.
Perhaps Wahlberg was dealing with a bit of an “unreliable narrator” by working so closely with Ward. It isn’t hard to imagine Ward misremembering or misrepresenting the truth, deliberately or inadvertently and Wahlberg being reluctant to correct him to avoid alienating the man behind the story. I have no evidence to back this up. But it seems plausible, at least, and not the biggest deal as such bending of the truth is par for the course in films “based on a true story.”
Keith, the boxing scenes were very well done and not overly stylized. The fight at the end versus Shea Neary for example uses the actual HBO commentary from the fight with Lampley, Merchant, and Roy Jones Jr. As a result, the action in the ring mimics what actually happened. The movie also gives the fight an accurate HBO look, substituting Wahlberg for Ward.
It has been almost a year since I saw the movie but one criticism I had at the time was that the movie acts like Micky became “The Champion” if I remember correctly. Even by today’s standards where there are multiple titles in each division, the WBU is a minor belt, not one of the four main sanctioning bodies (IBF, WBO, WBC, and WBA).
To give you a small taste of the real Ward in action, here is a link to Gatti vs Ward I, Round 9: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71tRlcy5Nbo
Man, what I’d do to have another set of fights like Ward-Gatti. Only recent fight that eclipses those is Castillo-Corrales (who, coincidentally, also died in a drunk driving accident).
Franco was great in Freaks and Geeks…since then its been pretty much downhill
Josh, this Saturday is Cotto-Margarito II, which should be another fantastic action fight. Also Agbeko-Mares II.
You’re right JK. Should be better particularly because Margarito won’t be able to use loaded wraps! I always thought it was weird how Cotto seemed to dominate the fight early, but his face was falling apart late. Hate Margarito, love Cotto, so I’m hoping for revenge.
Keith, thanks for the great reviews. The one thing I’d say though is that if you ever were to give Franco another chance, 127 Hours is the movie to do so. I agree with you spot on with your assessment of Franco based on those 3 works- truthfully, I like him not because he’s a good actor, but because he always looks like hes having a good time- but 127 Hours is completely different. His acting is nothing like anything I’ve seen him in. He displays many different emotions as a man trapped in his own head, going back and forth between giving up and trying to survive. All in all, not the worst way to spend 2 hours.
Because you havent reviewed Toy Story 3 does this mean you havent watched it either? Its not even close to Toy Story 2, which is one of the best movies i have ever watched. But its still worth your time. Especially since you have a child.
“From a real life story standpoint, the movie didn’t show any of Ward’s fights with Gatti, which are some of the best fights of the 2000s…”
The Gatti fights will be in the the sequel, this was Wahlberg’s plan all along apparently to do two fighter films – the second focusing on the Ward/Gatti trilogy. Apparently it’s being written by David O’Russell and Wahlberg is back in training to be in shape for the filming. Don’t have a link for this – I saw it on some random entertainment show when I was clicking through the channels a few nights ago.
What about seeing Amy Adams in season 2 of the Wire? That was a shocker for me!
That wasn’t Amy Adams. It was Amy Ryan
Micky’s doing fine now. He lives in Groton with his wife and co-owns a boxing gym above the Gold’s Gym in North Chelmsford. He also works as a teamster shuttling actors and actresses around. I was with him at the Boston Music Awards last week and he wasn’t drunk.
I think it was Bryan Adams on season two of the wire
As many have said I would love it if you gave Franco another chance in 127 Hours. Not just for his great performance but of the story itself. Danny Boyle did a lot of things to keep you engaged for those 1.5 hours.
As for what you’ve seen him in I agree Harry Osborn just didn’t work with him, while I just gave him a pass for the Oscars since they have terrible material anyways.
Franco has been great in things such as Milk and Pineapple Express, As you’ve always said Keith, small sample size. Doesn’t always tell you the whole story.
My bad. They actually sort of look alike.