Southpaw
Director: Antoine Fuqua
Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Rachel McAdams, Forest Whitaker, Oona Laurence, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson, Skylan Brooks, Naomie Harris, Victor Ortiz, Beau Knapp, Miguel Gomez, Dominic Colon, Malcolm M. Mays, Lana Young, Aaron Quattrocchi, Keith “Budshaw” Brady
Rating: C+
A star athlete on top of his game who falls from glory, then reaches the depths of despair, only to find his inner strength and triumph over adversity… these are the components in the latest attempt for pulling at moviegoer heartstrings in the boxing drama Southpaw. With many familiar clichés and an extremely predictable storyline, the film attempts to deliver a cinematic experience that will be a knockout at the box office.
Things kick off with a big left hook in its opening scene when boxing great Billy “The Great” Hope (Jake Gyllenhaal) wins a championship title. The boxing gladiator has the raw and ferocious presence of a man driven to succeed under circumstances most would shy away from. When the camera zooms in on the undefeated boxer we get a feeling of excitement that we are in for a film about a great sports adventure.
Billy is married to the love of his life Maureen (Rachel McAdams), and together they share a life with their beautiful ten-year-old daughter Leila (Oona Laurence) in a home that looks like a castle. The threesome is living a fairytale life when Maureen pleads with Billy that now is the time to retire from boxing. He is on top of his game and she warns that if he continues with the violent sport he may not be at the top forever. The loving and supportive wife begs Billy to bow out gracefully so that they can live wonderfully on whatever they have.
The Champ is asked to speak at a charity gala and that is when things take an unexpected and tragic turn. As the power couple is leaving the event they are accosted by Miguel “Magic” Escobar (Miguel Gomez), Billy’s boxing nemesis. Miguel shouts out insults and challenges Billy to step into the ring with him. A fight breaks out, shots are fired, and Maureen is killed (this is shown in the trailers and happens very early in the film, so please don’t cry “Spoilers!”).
The grief-stricken sports hero turns to alcohol and spirals down a dark path. Billy loses his manager to the competition, his house to foreclosure, his daughter to social services, and a match in the ring that ruins his career. Billy’s daughter becomes his motivation to return to the boxing ring and he seeks out the help of Tick (Forest Whitaker), a legendary trainer that could put Billy back in the game. It will be no big surprise who Billy will fight in the ring to make his big comeback.
There are a lot of emotional moments in the film as Billy tries to reconnect with his daughter while in his spare time he goes around smashing things or exchanging sob stories in a local pub with his new coach. The mushy moments are meant to evoke sympathy for our main character but really only succeed in slowing the film down and throwing its pacing off.
There are missed opportunities to interweave details into the film could have made Southpaw really intriguing. After Maureen’s death there are hints on who is responsible for killing her and that an innocent person is being accused of committing the crime. This entire storyline is brushed aside and just forgotten about. Then we have the relationship between Billy and his corrupt manager Jordan Mains (50 Cent), that we suspect has something to do with his client’s financial ruin but we never really know for sure. We are led to believe that Billy turns to alcohol and drugs to deal with the loss of his wife but we never really see the transition. The timeline in the movie is really choppy leaving how much time actually passes from Billy’s glory days to his disgrace a mystery. A hero’s fall from grace, a ruthless adversary, a grouchy trainer, a rise back to the top are just a few of the clichés Southpaw is loaded with leaving little new elements for audiences to enjoy.
A film which starts to fall apart with its predictability is saved by Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance. Watching his character’s horror as he holds his dying wife in his arms is enough to make anyone choke back the tears. Gyllenhaal pulls off the intensity of his character with facial expressions of a man dealing with many hardships in life who keeps struggling to do better for himself. The actor has a level of grit and determination that is captured in close up shots of a bruised and bloody face. He does great at a hard sell convincing us of a man filled with both rage and passion.
The shots of Gyllenhaal training for his next match and the final showdown in the ring do bring to light the skill and drive needed to succeed in the sport of boxing. The last twenty minutes of the movie are extremely intense as we watch two skilled fighters duke it out. Although most can already guess the outcome of the boxing tale, there are enough stressful nail-biting twists and turns in the last few rounds to keep audiences in engaged in the exercise.
