A knockout film!

Rating: 8/10 (29 November 2006)

Million Dollar Baby deserves all the acclaim it received and some. Ebert even calls this film a masterpiece and says it is Clint Eastwood's best film. Eastwood comes to us as director, producer, and lead actor in this knockout film. In more than one way Eastwood showed us that he is like wine  he gets better with age! In Million Dollar Baby, Hillary Swank plays Maggie Fitzgerald, a 30- year waitress who sees her only way out of the trailer park is boxing. Maggie feels that her only chance of winning is having Frankie Dunn (Eastwood) train her. Swank did such an excellent job acting, that when I see Swank to this day my heart still goes out to here. I have yet to be able to separate her from her character in this excellent film.
Frankie is a 70 year old trainer who is opposed to training a "girly." Frankie is dealing with guilt from two issues from his past. He hasn't spoken to his daughter in years and she won't even read his letters. Also, Frankie feels responsible for throwing in the towel too late in a fight with his boxer Eddie "Scrap-Iron Dupri (Morgan Freeman) years earlier. Frankie lets Scrap live at the gym and keep it up.
All three main characters have yet to make it big. Frankie, who is a trainer and "the best cut man," has never been able to get his fighters a title fight. Scrap is a retired fighter who lost eyesight in one eye after fighting one too many fights, yet sticks around to help Frankie run the gym. Maggie is "trailer trash" who's only way out of waiting tables for the rest of her life is to box. Destiny awaits this trio as Scrap convinces Frankie to train Maggie. But, don't underestimate this film, this is no shallow Rocky film.
Frankie initially refuses to train Maggie, but gives in after he sees her determination. He takes on a fatherly role and a deep bond between the two emerges. Frankie is all Maggie has, and without him, she can't make it. Frankie and Maggie's father-daughter relationship add depth to the emotional element as he substitutes her for his own estranged daughter.
Eastwood did an excellent job of expressing the theme of how life deals some hard and unfair blows. Similar to Ray, the message is clear, one is never to give up in the fight of life. You can't change the cards that have been dealt, you just have to play your hand the best you can. And Eastwood, masterfully exhibits this as Frankie tells Maggie the number one rule in boxing is "to protect yourself at all times" Freeman narrates this film as he did in Shaw Shank Redemption. At one point in this film Scrap, in his very serious and solemn voice, talks about how boxing is an unnatural act and "everything in boxing is backwards." Life seems to be backwards at times especially when bad things happen to good people. This film begins as a traditional fight film, but the backwardness creeps in and brings with it a more profound and realistic meaning.
Million Dollar Baby takes a surprising plunge to the dark side of life that we see often. It explores how we respond to fate, especially when it seems we deserve something more. But, Eastwood does a superb job of exploring the complexities of the blows that life deals and the subsequent decisions that we have to make.
The lighting, or lack thereof, throughout the film contributed to this theme by adding a dark and gloomy element to the harsh reality of what happens to Maggie. Maggie's life was rough from start to finish. There never appeared to be any lasting sunshine. Therefore, cinematographer Tom Stern kept the majority of this picture in poorly lighted dressing rooms, dark restaurants, and of course the typical stark gym where pain and punishment were endured daily.
Paul Haggis does the screenplay in this film and adapted it from several stories out of Rope burns: Stories From the Corner, a 2000 book by Jerry Boyd, who was a veteran fight manager and "cut man" writing under the pseudonym F.X. Toole.
Overall, the theme was expressed very well and it had a profound emotional effect as it caused sorrow and pity for all the characters as we watched them each deal with the blows that life had dealt them. We expected sensationalism and the traditional underdog theme, but Eastwood brought us life with all its blows! This is a must see!!!