The Fighter (2010): I was kindly invited to join two friends last night for a viewing of the new boxing film The Fighter. Starring Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale and Amy Adams, The Fighter is the supposed inspirational story of former boxing champion Micky Ward. Overcoming hardships and family despair, Ward (Wahlberg) makes an unlikely run at the Welterweight boxing title. After hearing all the buzz surrounding this movie I was pretty eager to finally get the chance to see it. However, by the end of the film, the only excitement I was feeling unfortunately was that the movie was finally over.
Why was this film made? What is really inspirational about this story? It appears that they were attempting to create a real-life Rocky Balboa story, but after the film was over, I honestly felt LESS about Micky Ward and his boxing skills. To me it appeared that Ward got extremely lucky that he EVER got a title chance, and in the title match, he got the crap beat out of him and then got off a few lucky shots to somehow steal the victory. To cap it all off, the film completely skips over the fights that Micky Ward is best known for, his 3 battles with Arturo Gatti. The Fighter also has a bad identity crisis. I couldn’t tell if it was trying to be a serious drama or a comedy. For instance, I found the audience laughing at moments that I thought were supposed to be serious. And who was this movie supposed to be about? At times I thought I watching a movie that was more about Ward’s half brother Dickie (Bale) and his struggle with crack addiction more then I was watching a film about Micky Ward and boxing.
The script and writing was horrendous, and through out the movie I found characters talking over one another to the point of not understanding any of them. There were also entire lines of dialogue that got lost because the actor was mumbling so bad you couldn’t understand what they were saying. I also found myself scratching my head at some of the odd filming and camera choices from the Director of Photography on this film. Weird camera angles, the occasional unexplained shaky camera, especially during the prison conversation between Wahlberg and Bale, and way too many super close-ups made this film feel amateurish and frustrating to watch.
The pre-Oscar hype machine has Christian Bale as the front runner for the Best Supporting Actor award. I’ve enjoyed Christian Bale over the years, and believe he has been looked over in the past when it comes to being honored for his memorable portrayals. This role for him however is one of his weakest, and I would feel disappointed if this was the performance he’s most remembered for. As far as Mark Wahlberg’s performance in the Fighter, unfortunately he either shows no pulse, or is over-excitedly hamming it up for the camera, especially during his fight scenes. The only star in this film that was able to overcome the shoddy script and give an intense and raw performance was the beautiful and alluring Amy Adams. She easily stole every scene she was in, and made The Fighter watchable for me.
Some critics have The Fighter as a Best Picture contender. I have to say that if The Fighter actually wins the Oscar’s top prize, it will go down as one of the worst Best Picture films of all time. However, seeing how bad this year has been overall, perhaps 2010 deserves to have The Fighter represent it as its Best Picture. (** Stars)
you made some good points to the problems with the film. i felt it was like watching rocky and enjoyed it but that may be because i never get to go out.
ReplyDeleteI liked it more then you did. 3 stars but I wanted to run over the herd of sisters in a combine.
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