Whaddamovie!!

Rating: 9/10 (14 June 2012)

9/10 hands down, and I feel that I am being far too harsh. What else can you say. In the movie, Paul Giamatti's character says, 'Sometimes you see something in a fighter. You don't even know if it real, you're looking for it so bad'. The same can be said of this movie. You look and look through a hundred films and then suddenly you stumble upon one that makes you sway, gives you goosebumps, and 'you don't know if it's real', it's so good. It changes who you are.
The eternal struggle of the middle class and the dogged, silent determination to fight against unearthly odds is the substrate on which this boxing movie is built, and it has been executed to perfection. The movie is Russell Crowe all the way and in my personal opinion this performance of his is better than The Maximus Decimus Meridius. When he stands amidst the club members begging for alms with tears of shame in his eyes you really get to see what metal he is made of.
Renee Zellweger's short role is articulated with such finesse that you do not even realise that it has relatively so little screen time. She and Crowe share such a chemistry, even in their zero-glamour looks in zero-glamour surroundings.
Another standout performer is Paul Giamatti. The man always delivers but this one is out-of-the-blue extraordinary. The ramble he goes on after the first comeback fight is what I can watch all day long and not get bored. An Oscar was what was truly deserved, but I guess the judges didn't see the things I saw.
The final fight has been picturised as if it were a battle for life, not the title. The commentary and Round 11 makes your hair stand on end. You get so involved that you do not even realise that lasts for almost the entire last half-hour of the movie. Craig Bierko delivers a little gem as Max Baer. An unexpected yet pleasant surprise.
And finally, Ron Howard. Always been a fan of the man, but this movie points a finger to your eye and shows what a great director can achieve with a good script. He has even outdone himself in Cinderella Man and he has set the bar so high that none of his subsequent films have quite been upto the mark, in spite of them all being pretty good movies on their own.
It's not a movie, it's a legacy. It's a way of life.
It's just a rags to riches story, but it is the greatest one ever told.