An authentic fraternal boxers story which is more than just about fighting. Family, brotherhood, self-reassurance, drags, glory and that are life, and life is full of pretty much everything. I believe there is not a single movie which merely focusing on one theme, but how to make it coherent, relevant and heartfelt is hard. And The Fighter just nails it.
The story is a biopic based on the 90s former WBU Light Welterweight Campion.
Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg) was living in the shadow of his half brother Dicky Eklund (Christian Bale) who was a former Welterweight Champion. The story is expectable, they rise they fall and they get back up. But what make it different from the others in the same genre? This family must come together, dominant Mother, understanding father, cracked Dicky, confused Micky, and 7 crazy sisters. The genuine dynamics of the family light up the story. The way their family struggles to stay united, moves the audience from the heartbeat.
Family can be the poison and the remedy at the same time. Micky would have a total different career if he had gone away to get trained in Vegas. His mother/his manager always putting pressure on him, telling him that he should not trust anyone beyond his family, which resulted Dicky was Micky’s trainer who often showed up late wasted. Micky got hold back by his family. Dicky got back on his feet when he noticed he was dragging his brother down, it motivated him to get clean and be the brother/trainer he had to be.
How to stand up from the mistake you have made? From the start of the movie we all acknowledge Dicky was a junkie, by his hollow eyes and his skinny figure. The irony was Dicky kept boasting that HBO was making a film on him, the truth was they were making a documentary on the downside of drags “High on Crack Street: Lost Lives In Lowell”. He was too wasted to notice anything wrong, not until he was soba watching it together with all the inmates. And there was the magic moment, he suddenly woke up from the dark. People are horrified to notice or face their own flaws, once they fall hard, real hard, then they will understand. There is no talking sense into them, we only have to wait and give them our hands when they are willingly to take them.
Bale, he once again dropped tremendous weight for playing a role, yet this time he was not as skeletal as his role in the “Machinist”. The determination and compelling performance just take your breath away. And it earns him the award for the best supporting male actor in the Oscar and the Globe. Melissa Leo also won best supporting female actress in the Oscar, which make this is the first movie to win both supporting actor and actress since 1986.
The effort of the casts is noticeable, Bale, Leo, Adam and even Wahlbery had been preparing to get into the shape of the real Micky for four years having his PT along with him on set in everything single movie he had made in the past four years.
This is inspiring, not only because the authenticity of the story itself but also the determination of the whole crew.
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