David O. Russell's "The Fighter"

Boxing movies certainly seem to be of the more formulaic and repetitive storylines produced for audiences. Yet, upon watching David O. Russell's "The Fighter" I find myself entirely transfixed by an engaging family centered drama that happens to feature a bit of boxing. Christian Bale redeems himself for a few less than amazing performances this past year with his no less than extraordinary take on town-hero, crack-addict, trainer and ex-boxer Dickie Ecklund. Mark Wahlberg plays "Irish" Mickey Wade, whom has had a less than stellar career helmed by his overbearing managing mother and over shadowing brother. Melissa Leo, as the boys’ mother Alice Wade, plays her heart out and constructs a character that commandeers the tone of every scene she is in. The combination of Christian Bale and Melissa Leo’s performances on screen gives light to an honest and hard knock family dynamic, rarely captured in a film oozing with this much authenticity. The gorgeous Amy Adams continues to expand her palette of characters with a very strong-willed and unassailable presence as Mickie's new found love interest. One last shout out has to go to my own personal favorite the ill-fated Chief Jerry Reilly, from the stellar Rescue Me series. Jack McGee stands just as strong as the rest of this cast as a sidelined patriarch George Ward.

This movie is about the glue and the love within a family driving them to stay together and conquer the world’s, as well as their own self imposed, hurdles. It is after the last ounces of willpower and intuition are spent up and any normal individual might abandon their blatantly crack addicted brethren to their fate, that this family continues to pull together and offer those last chances which populate so many sports films. There in the family storylines do we see the real redemptive aspects of this boxing film. Wahlberg’s Mickey Ward fights his own obvious battles within the ring, but those confrontations are most poignant when paralleled to the scalding nature of this down to earth and gritty Ward family.

Favorite moment: As Mickey has yet to turn the final fight to his favor, and he is really looking to lose, Dickie focuses his battered little brother and reminds him to take everything from outside the ring, all the heartache, the feelings of betrayal, all the hurt and manifest it all into this last round. It is one of the only moments Dickie is clear enough to notice that this is his brother’s chance. This scene is the culmination of some not very impressive fight scenes, though charismatically shot with a “real-life” HBO themed video style that does lend the fights a bit of help, but they are not “WOW” material.


This is a fantastic guy’s night out, date movie, and all around pre-Oscar contender to certainly go out of your way to see!