The Fighter (2010)

Title, Year:  The Fighter (2010)

Director:  David O. Russell

It sounds cliché’ to say, but The Fighter is truly a film that sneaks up on you.  The dramatic momentum builds throughout the film and, as in the best sports-based dramas, inevitably overwhelms you with emotion.  To me, what sets this film apart from other sports films is that the family drama within, as well as the superb actors delivering the roles, makes you forget that you are even watching a “sports film”.  This film is in a class with the first Rocky and, one of my favorites, Miracle. 

The Fighter tells the true story of Dicky Ecklund and Micky Ward, two brothers who share a mother and a love for boxing.  Living in Lowell, Massachusetts, Dicky famously stood ten rounds with Sugar Ray Leonard in the seventies and has since become a drug-addled dreamer and a disappointment to everyone except himself and his mother, played by Melissa Leo.  Christian Bale delivers a truly great performance as Dicky.  Melissa and Christian create the kind of lived in, completely transformative performances that become legendary.  Seriously, they are that good at becoming these characters and making you “know” these characters as much as one possibly can within the constraints of a movie.  Mark Wahlberg plays Micky with a solid, stoic calm that largely went unrecognized in the press that this film received, but I feel he served the character well.  Amy Adams was also very good as Charlene, the only girl to dare to step between Micky and his family.  Amy portrays a strength that I’ve yet to see in her other films and she delivers on this opportunity to demonstrate her range. 

The family element is strong in this film.  Micky and Dicky have seven sisters, some who share a father with Dicky and some with Micky.  I’ve read that they cast ladies from the Lowell area to portray the sisters, they are all unrecognizable.  They do a fine job by adding to the atmosphere and helping to demonstrate the roots these brothers share.  These are people from a lower working class, struggling area of Massachusetts.  The year is 1993, but the economic conditions they face are timely to other areas of the country today.  The struggle that these people have is relevant. 

The only other piece of the story I will elaborate on is that the film centers on the relationship between the brothers, Dicky and Micky.  I won’t give anything else way.  The film is named The Fighter and I feel that this can be a term used to refer to any of the characters profiled in this film.  You will see what I mean when you watch it, and watch it you should. 

The Fighter was nominated for a Best Picture Oscar and lost to The King’s Speech, a film I have yet to see.  It must be good though, because The Fighter is top-notch movie making.