Man is an athletic champion. Man suffers personal tragedy. Man struggles to fix his life. Man trains to win again. Man wins contest and regains his life. Add that he's white and wealthy, and try not to gag.
We've all heard it. We've all seen it. There is literally nothing fresh about it. So how did I end up gasping and crying my way through the two-hour sports drama?
Because Southpaw is different. Because director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, King Arthur) holds no punches back from the brutality of the sport in question. Because cinematographer Mauro Fiore (Avatar) keeps things heavy, dark, and gritty. Because writer Kurt Sutter (Sons of Anarchy) poetically captures the horrors of an environment that is usually glamorized in our culture. Because the late great composer of epics James Horner (Titanic) very subtly mirrors our protagonist's descent into hell and eventual redemption with his score.
And, of course, the bulk of praise goes to Jake Gyllenhaal, who once again proves his determination to transform himself into his characters. After last year's Nightcrawler, when he lost weight, grew out his hair, and articulately perfected his character, Gyllenhaal has here bulked up, buzzed his hair, and solemnly retreated into the recesses of his mind. Much like Tom Hardy in last year's The Drop, Gyllenhaal keeps us guessing as to his exact personality because he so flawlessly portrays a man who has given his all to his body and the sport that he can scarcely articulate his feelings. And yet he allows us a few moments of genuine vulnerability, especially when we see him with his daughter; we also see, through some magic he works, his true character in his moments alone as he battles his demons, both in the ring and out.
If you know me at all, you know I love horror movies. I can usually handle the violence, no sweat. But I have a lot of trouble with watching fistfighting, which often happens out of the blue (remember Gangster Squad? Sheesh). I was expecting a fair amount here, but I had to cover my eyes a lot in this movie. That just goes to show, though, how determined the cast and crew were to show the physical effects of boxing on the human body. Fuqua never shies away from the blood, the sweat, and (most unnerving for me) the close-ups. It's in these moments that this film doesn't feel like most sports dramas, in which the sweat makes the characters look glorious, and the brief dripping blood is the most disturbing part of the film.
Rather, here we see horrors well beyond the field. The disparities between celebrity athletes and street fighters, the financial problems of inner-city youth, the isolating effects of a parent's death on her child. Fuqua and Sutter also (and, I think, most successfully) hide certain moments of violence from us, probably to keep the already dark film out of the realm of exploitation or horror. They don't refrain from discussing these moments, or even from seeing their tragic aftermath. But we don't see, for example, the fatal shooting of our protagonist's wife. We don't see the death of the young black man our protagonist is training. But we don't have to. Those moments are quite brutal enough, attesting to the abilities of our filmmakers. And the absence of these moments is more than made up for in the (in my opinion) extravagantly violent boxing scenes.
If nothing else, at least see this picture for Gyllenhaal. He's incredible.
IMDb: Southpaw
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