Not the best picture of the year but still pretty good

Rating: 8/10 (1 April 2005)

Million Dollar Baby is one of the best pictures you will see all year. A young woman named Maggie Fitzgerald (Hilary Swank) is taken under the wing of a crotchety boxing trainer (Clint Eastwood) and his long-time friend, a retired boxer played by Morgan Freeman, as she tries to become the women's boxing champion. The plot is nothing new but they certainly do a good job of making old material feel and look good. The story was just executed so well that I really got into the film. The screenplay may be full of clichés but the film is able to rise above those to pretty great heights. Some of the movie isn't very realistic but that's just a few of the scenes. The characters are all interesting but they could have done a better job with Maggie's family. The boxing scenes may not be as good as the ones in Rocky but they are still done pretty well. The acting is great and probably some of the best you will see all year. Hilary Swank sure makes up for The Core with this knockout performance. Morgan Freeman does a good job too but I'm not really sure if he deserved an Oscar for this. Clint Eastwood did a great job of directing keeping the film at a nice pace and he did a good job acting as well. The film is 132 minutes long but it didn't feel that long since the film keeps you interested. Even though most of the film is pretty predictable there are still a couple of twists that may take you by surprise. The ending is pretty depressing and it made me want to cry since she had gone all that way and went through all that training and wanted to die like that. It was a very emotionally powerful film that will pull on the heartstrings at some scenes. Rating 9/10 a very good film while it may not be perfect its still worth watching.