Unless you are really into the world of professional boxing, chances are you haven’t heard of Micky Ward or his half-brother, Dick “Dicky” Eklund. These two brothers were something to be seen spanning the late 70s into the early 2000s. The bigger name of the two, Micky, was the light welterweight title holder in 2000. The film The Fighter is about the early part of Micky’s career as well as his rocky relationship with Dicky, his family, and his girlfriend, Charlene. Sports movies have been hit and miss at the Oscars with Rocky and Chariots of Fire being amongst the heavy hitters of the genre. The Fighter is right up there with those two, failing to win the Best Picture but being a great movie nonetheless. The film even showcases the real brothers in a brief clip over the credits to give us a look at their real relationship and personalities and showcase how the two actors did in portraying them.
Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg) is an American welterweight boxer from Massachusetts; managed by his mother, Alice (Melissa Leo), and trained by his older half-brother, Dicky (Christian Bale). Dicky is a former boxer who prides himself on having once knocked down Sugar Ray Leonard in 1978 when the future champion was still an up-and-comer. Lately, though, Dicky has fallen into drug addiction and petty crime, often missing training sessions with Micky.
Micky is caught off guard when his next scheduled fight is altered when his opponent is taken ill. Instead, he is put up against a boxer twenty pounds heavier, a huge difference in professional boxing. His mother and brother tell him that the fighter is rusty and out of shape, which turns out to be incorrect, and Micky is easily defeated. Frustrated, he turns his back on the ring. During this time, he begins dating bartender Charlene (Amy Adams). Micky’s family sets up another fight for him, but Micky doesn’t want to get back into it after the last one, and the family is quick to blame Charlene for his lack of interest. Infighting ensues, Dicky gets arrested for trying to steal money and impersonating a cop, and everyone is at each other’s throats.
There is so much family drama on display here, and I would think this is all over the top had I not seen footage of the real-life people and seen that they were a lot like this in reality. There is plenty more footage out there than just what is shown in the end credits, and these people really were this manic and outlandish. Surprisingly, Micky is the most laid-back and uninteresting character in the film, and Mark Wahlberg is playing him too downbeat in comparison to everyone else. The Academy felt the same way, and he ended up being the only one of the four leads who didn’t get an Oscar nomination.
Christian Bale is delivering another of his transformative performances here. He is so gaunt and sickly looking that it is creepy. This is not as severe of a transformation as in The Machinist, but it is close. His character is a crack addict, and he looks the part, losing a significant amount of weight to get this unhealthy look. You can believe this man is a drug addict just looking at him. Seeing this so soon after he bulked up for The Dark Knight, it is hard to believe this is the same man. This is the kind of thing Christian Bale is known for; he would take it in the opposite direction when he portrayed Dick Chaney in Vice. It’s the kind of dedication and willpower few actors have.
The real eye-opener here, though, is Michelle Leo. She has been in a lot of films before and after this, just not films I happen to have seen. Because of that, I have nothing in her oeuvre to compare this performance to. She absolutely nails the Boston accent, and I can believe she is from the area. What I struggle with is just how over-the-top this character is. Just about everything sends her into a frenzy. This is never more obvious than when she and the girls go full-on nuclear on Charlene in front of her house, launching a physical assault on her because they believe she is turning Micky complacent. We see a similar bout of rage when word gets to her that Dicky is being arrested outside a restaurant the family is dining at. This leads to another violent encounter, this time with the police, leaving Micky with a busted hand and arrested in a blatant case of police brutality. There is one great scene, though, prior to Dicky’s arrest, where she catches him sneaking out of the crack house he has been hiding in with his friends. He knows he’s been busted and gets quietly into her car. Her response is surprisingly somber and quiet, disappointed in her son.
Because this is also a sports movie, we are going to get several boxing scenes. These moments are more akin to what you’d see on PPV than in something like Rocky. There is no overtly fancy camera work and slow-motion trying to upsell the drama. I haven’t watched a lot of fights over the years, but the ones I have seen are more like a strategy match than a whole bunch of haymakers and uppercuts; we see that strategy here whenever Micky is in the ring. During Micky’s comeback fight, he is overwhelmed much of the bout, looking like he is going to be KO’d easily round after round. He wins it after incorporating a strategy Dicky gave him over the phone from prison. Dicky has pulled himself together while in prison and wants to put his life back together. Upon release, though, he’s told he isn’t allowed to coach Micky anymore as part of the deal to get Micky a championship bout. This news almost sends Dicky back to his drug friends, but instead, he makes amends with Charlene and his family and becomes a key component in coaching his brother to a championship victory.
This film is not your typical sports drama. The boxing actually comes second to the family and the relationship dramas. It’s an actor’s movie that is more about the characters than it is about anything else. Its biggest hiccup is Mark Wahlberg in the lead. He’d be fine in it, but surrounded by everyone else’s amazing performances, he just doesn’t measure up. He has the lead role, but it’s the secondary characters that are overshadowing him at every turn. When he is tasked with commanding the screen, he just can’t quite do it. This film could have been so much better with a stronger actor in this role. Mark Wahlberg has turned in some great performances in his career, but this one is just not quite there.
Because Mark Wahlberg is so one-note in this, it really brings the film down a notch. When you see the clip of the real brothers on screen, you can see Christian Bale in the real Dicky. You cannot see Mark Wahlberg in the real Micky. Whether or not he was just trying to make the character his own or he couldn’t replicate the real person, it just doesn’t work. It’s too bad because it is the only real sour note in an otherwise exemplary feature. Because the film relies so much on Mark hitting it out of the park, it derailed any chance that The Fighter would win the Best Picture of 2010.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Picture: David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman, and Mark Wahlberg
Best Director: David O. Russell
Best Supporting Actor: Christian Bale (won)
Best Supporting Actress: Amy Adams
Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Leo (won)
Best Original Screenplay: Scott Silver, Paul Tamasy, Eric Johnson, and Keith Dorrington
Best Film Editing: Pamela Martin
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Release Date: December 17, 2010
Running Time: 116 Minutes
Rated R
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale, Amy Adams, and Melissa Leo
Directed By: David O. Russell
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