On the couch

DVD REVIEW

The Fighter ****
Directed by: David O Russell
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale, Melissa Leo, Amy Adams

There are no surprises in The Fighter. And boxing is a game of lies.
Everything you’ve heard about the film is true – the performances, the story, the grittiness, the quality, it’s all there. Except the film you expect and the film you see are two decidedly different things.
If you’re expecting a rock ‘em sock ‘em fight flick where a gutsy blue collar hero finally gets the success he deserves then you won’t be entirely disappointed, but the film’s real focus is on the fight just to get boxer Micky Ward in the ring and the family politics that threatens to throw his career off the rails at any moment.
Based on the life of Massachusetts boxer “Irish” Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg), director David O Russell paints a sometimes grim but fascinating picture of Ward’s spiky relationships with his half-brother and trainer Dicky Eklund (Christian Bale) – a once talented boxer fallen into drug abuse – and his mother, Alice (Melissa Leo) who serves as his manager.
The film follows Ward’s life and career from a string of losses that saw him quit the fight game for a while to his return to form and his first steps en route to the bouts – a trio of wars with Arturo Gatti – that would make him a legend in his sport.
Deserving winners of the best supporting actor and actress awards at last year’s Oscars, both Bale and Leo have a lot to work with in their two characters. Drug-addled Eklund is a consumate showman and loser and only seems to know what he’s doing when he’s in the ring. Alice, meanwhile, is a bitter, suspicious old bird who rules her extended family with an iron fist.
Wahlberg, meanwhile, has less of a gregarious character to work with but manages to bring Ward’s conflicted nature and desire to do right by everyone in his life, including himself, to life with dignity and conviction.
As Ward’s new girlfriend, Charlene, Amy Adams gets some cracking catty dialogue with Alice and Micky’s sisters and proves herself far more than just a pretty face or a lightweight comic actor.
One of the only sources of disappointment in The Fighter is, ironically, the actual boxing. Fans of the fistic arts hoping for some artfully shot and choreographed action – as seen in Michael Mann’s Ali – will be left slightly cold by the fight scenes which look stagey and unrealistic and lack any real sense of drama or “thump”.
Another small and somewhat petty point to pick is Wahlberg himself who, having trained for the roll since 2005, possess an heroic leading man physique that the real Micky Ward just didn’t possess. A small niggle at best however and one that will only bother the most nerdly of boxing fans.
What The Fighter is, when it comes down to it, is an unavoidably predictable story (it really happened like that – what’s a director to do?) jam-packed with a collection of fantastic performances that allow it to punch way above its weight.
While comparisons with Rocky might be easy to make – from humble beginnings through adverse training conditions a blue collar champion finally faces his demons and triumphs – in truth The Fighter has far more brains and a lot less heart than Stallone’s magnum opus.
While you’ll never unconsciously bob your head watching Ward take on his various opponents or feel your eyes moisten at his highest and lowest moments, there’s a lot more going on here than the Italian Stallion’s simple tale – despite this and despite all its other good qualities, however, it never quite satisfies the way you want it to and in the end suffers slightly because of it.
A strange turn indeed given “Irish” Micky Ward was know as one of the gutsiest, big-hearted fighters ever to lace up a pair of gloves.