Oh, David O. Russell, you certainly know how to direct a film. He does, you know. If you've seen "I Heart Huckabees" or "Three Kings" then you should agree. I just saw "The Fighter", Russell's take on the old standby of a genre, the boxing film, and now witnessing his masterful directorial skills has given me what us completely heterosexual men call a "man crush" and an "urge to have sex with him". Russell stands out as he always seems to have stood out, rather than taking the old formula and renaming it, he takes it, gives it a little spit shine, moves a few parts around, adds a few new parts, takes out some old pieces, and serves it all up with the best work from a collective cast you've seen all year.
I'll focus mainly on the work of the actors, but first I need to commend Russell himself. He presents parts of the movie in a very meta-documentary fashion, with the camera following a film crew following Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg) and his family rather than just follow them around on the shaky handicam itself, a style that seems to have taken a predominately cliched seat in the film and television world as of late. It's particularly effective once the action moves to the ring and the camera takes on the unique scratchy and unusually bright filter that is unique to televised pay-per-view, it's simple but just perfect, like a great bowl of soup. Like clam chowder. Like a great big bowl of New England clam chowder.
This movie takes place in New England (nailed the transition!). Lowell, Massachusetts to be exact, and everything about that fact is embraced and presented in the most beautifully poignant ways that a economically defunct small town can be presented. The setting we are introduced to in the opening credit sequence are about as gritty and real as a non-simulated plate of grits (now that's gritty and real... fuck all of you). The neighborhood in which our protagonist lives is one of obvious poverty and suffers from a huge case of being located in Massachusetts. Micky's family, who provide more than sufficient antagonism for him through the course of the movie is the biggest bundle of white trash you'll see outside of a KKK yard sale.
It's made clear right away that the family is dysfunctional. Not only do the eight sisters (that's an estimation, if I had to look at them long enough to count them my genitals would shrivel until they resembled a mummy's uvula) have difficulty explaining who came from which father, but their hair alone gives some indication of the early nineties hellhole from which they had emerged. Melissa Leo plays the matriarchal tycoon of the family. Given the jumbled accounts of her past (she had half of her brood by one man and then remarried to the man who would soon father Micky and the other half of the family... or something) she clearly either had a condom allergy, or was a bit of a whore. She also plays a royal class bitch better than any actress I've seen in a long time. It's a phenomenal performance, but to say it stands out in this movie is like saying Peter stood out amongst the disciples, or that George stood out amongst the Beatles. She's a team player in a group that is all talent and who all lend a small part to a project that is made better as a result, it's their collective effort and unique contributions that make the final result so memorable (Ringo was the goofy one, Judas was the betrayish one).
That being said, let's move on to the real meat of this movie, the three people who make "The Fighter" what it is, Mark Wahlberg, Amy Adams, and Christian "Motherfucking" Bale.
Mark Wahlberg plays Micky Ward, the fighter who has never really broken into the big leagues and as of yet has not managed to follow in the shadow of his big brother, who's claim to fame is once knocking down Sugar Ray Leonard in a fight. The problem is that Micky's family is the worst. Not the worst family, the worst thing ever. They are comically disfunctional, with all the sisters siding with the mom, the mom favoring the older brother, Dicky, over Micky, and Micky's father constantly trying and failing to get a voice of authority in the family over the mother. After a documentary about crack addiction centers its focus around his brother and destroys his family's reputation, Micky decides to fight and push himself out of the small times with a possible shot at a title belt. He, like his father, is repressed by his bitch of a mother, might as well start calling her Alice now to put a name to the evil, evil face.
Amy Adams plays Charlene, Micky's girlfriend who has twice the sass of a Tyler Perry movie and triple the appeal. She's the only one who supports Micky unselfishly and she defends him the only way she knows how, with a no-nonsense, sharp-witted bitchy attitude. She's badass who actually has one of the better fight scenes in the movie. Her confrontation with Dicky Eklund is the most emotionally powerful scenes of this past year in cinema.
And with the mention of Dicky Eklund I find myself unable to put it off any longer, I must talk about the shining diamond of a presence in this film that is Christian "Motherfucking" Bale. He plays Dicky Eklund, Micky's older brother. Micky idolizes him, which poses the central problem in the film, being that Micky finds it almost impossible to cut his brother out of his life even after Dicky collapses under rampant drug use. Bale masterfully portrays a character who means well and wants to stay loyal and helpful to his family, but can't help but let his own selfish needs interfere. The thick Bostonian accent and wide, glassy-eyed stare are the icing on this orgasm cake of a performance, and in case I haven't made it clear yet, my money's on him for the Oscar this year for Best Supporting Actor. To portray an antagonist who desperately means well, but can't shake his own demons.
The great thing about "The Fighter" is that the main fight isn't Micky Ward's struggle to the top, but rather the struggle to avoid his dysfunctional family from keeping him down while not wanting to compromise his love for them. "The Fighter" is a true cinematic triumph this year and sure to become a classic. I implore you to seek out and watch this film, I promise you won't want it to end.
AWESOME. Loved that you, too, refer to him as Christian Motherfucking Bale :)
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