Micky Ward was a local boxing champion whose career in the ring fizzled out after series of losing bouts in the early 1990’s. He was always in the shadow of his older half-brother Dicky who was something of a hero in Lowell, their blue-collar hometown in Mass, and who was still coasting along on the legend that as a boxer himself, he had came so close to greatness, but after a bad defeat had now succumbed to an addiction to crack.
Dicky egged on by his large and dysfunctional family, led by a control freak of a mother, undertakes to train his brother for a comeback, but after some bizarre behavior and very questionable motives, Micky eventually realizes that that he is just being used by them all. Dicky turns to crime and gets locked away, and Micky falls in love and learns how to start making some of his own decisions. And finally things start going right. For some of them anyway.
‘The Fighter’ is so much more than ‘just another boxing movie’. This remarkable film is a melodrama, a love story, but most of all tells of a wonderfully complicated brotherly relationship that is almost as battering as the physical fighting in the ring itself. The fact that it is based on a true story makes it even more compelling.
Dicky is played by a very gaunt Christian Bale in a stunning scene-stealing performance that totally mesmerized me, and if Melissa Leo doesn’t win an Oscar as the merciless matriarch there is no justice in this world. Mark Wahlberg looks superb as Micky but you never seem to really be completely in his corner desperately wanting him to win. I still cannot decide if that was because he so underplayed the role, or that is how Micky really was.
R.T.V. This is not a movie I thought I would like. And I didn’t. I actually really loved it. Really loved it. I came out of the theater on such a high that had me quite speechless. Very rare indeed.
★★★★★★★★★
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Posted by queerguru at 00:47
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