A Story of Redemption

Rating: 9/10 (23 February 2006)

When you make a film with characters, true characters, you have won half the battle. The characters in this film are on a crash course with emptiness, until they find each other. The tired, stagnant life of the Clint Eastwood fight manager, Morgan Freeman, who has sold his needs to watch his friend, and, of course, Hillary Swank, who is trying to find someplace to keep her from ending up like her trailer trash family. If one were to simply look at the plot, it would seem pretty trite. Girl wants to be a fighter (a contemporary possibility; her gender really isn't important), manager hasn't had a fighter in years (he is a curmudgeon who sees the negative in things), and the talent will out. But then the element of tragedy rears its ugly head, and the plot becomes more complex. But it is the characterization that wins the day. We get to know and love these three people (actually a fourth; a young boxer who continues to get the crap beat out of him but who provides another example of what we should be. It is, of course, ultimately about love: love for self, love for others, and love for why we are put on this earth. I was really moved by this film. It is a masterpieces of redemption and will. It is about victory through pain.