It worked, and yet I'm SO disappointed . . . .

Rating: 5/10 (4 June 2005)

The story is heart-warming, the characters are endearing, the pictures on the screen are beautiful, even the music is stirring -- so why am I disappointed? Everything is so OBVIOUS. There are no surprises. No complexity, no nuances, no grace notes.
I was really looking forward to seeing this. But apparently there's only one boxing movie that can be made, and it's called Rocky. This is just another remake of Rocky. And Rocky's already been remade four times.
Prepare to be manipulated shamelessly. Not that it didn't work on me -- it did, I just resented it. I enjoyed watching Russell Crowe and Renee Zellweger. They're pretty people and they get dressed in pretty clothes. They play nice people, who have three adorable children. You want nice things to happen to them. When bad things happen to them, you feel bad. (Hope that's not a spoiler for anybody.) But why can't Hollywood take all these tremendously talented people (both in front of and behind the camera) and all of its bloody money and throw them at a script we haven't seen before?