A powerful and spiritual journey from Clint Eastwood

Rating: Null/10 (14 February 2005)

MIllion Dollar Baby
***1/2/out of 4
Clint Eastwood is growing older, but nothing can stop him from making original and emotionally powerful films. Many directors like Martin Scorsese and Sydney Pollack have turned to making huge Hollywood blockbusters with crowd-pleasing special effects. Eastwood has not. "Million Dollar Baby" defies all Hollywood boxing movie clichés and is certainly one of the best films of the year. Like Eastwood's American tragedy "Mystic River," "Million Dollar Baby" is very pessimistic and takes dark and tragic turns. But, unlike "Mystic River," it is a very spiritual film and feels much more personal.
Hilary Swank, in her 2nd best performance ("Boys Don't Cry" being her best), plays Maggie Fitzgerald. Maggie is a white-trash girl who spends her time as a waitress when she's not in the boxing gym pushing towards her dream. Frankie Dunn (Eastwood) owns the gym and when Maggie asks him to train her, his response is: "Girly tough ain't enough." Morgan Freeman, in his best role since "The Shawshank Redemtion," plays Eddie Dupris. Eddie lost an eye when he was training with Frankie and Eastwood does a miraculous job of portraying the two aging friends' sense of loss. As Frankie begins to train Maggie, the film starts as a typical Hollywood film, but then takes an unexpected turn, making an exciting boxing film into a heart-wrenching journey of the human soul. Eastwood's use of extensive lighting gives a sense of all the guilt and sin in the seemingly normal atmosphere. Also, the musical score, as in "Mystic River," is very simple and quiet--one of the reasons why it stays with you so much. Like "Closer" and "Collateral," "Million Dollar Baby" is one of the few widely- released films this year that surely proves itself, with the help of a masterful artist, to be an extraordinary work of art.