two cent baby

Rating: Null/10 (12 January 2005)

I cannot believe anyone really likes this movie. I could understand it if people were simply extolling the artistic elements of the film. It is certainly a film made with artistry -- three well-defined and interesting characters, haunting score, amazing lighting. But aren't films supposed to tell a good story?? Here we have Hilary Swank who has been paralyzed after losing (??) a title fight in which her opponent cheapshotted her after the bell. Now she wants to die because she has nothing left to live for after the wonders of female boxing fame. She can't do it on her own (though not for lack of trying -- the tongue swallowing sequence definitely gets her an A for effort), so she asks Clint to pull the plug. He has a very brief bout with his conscience, talks to the world's meanest priest (who, by the way, must HATE his own job since he can't understand why on earth anyone would actually want to go to Mass), but "compassion" wins in the end and Clint shoots her full of adrenaline and pulls her air (hospital security here leaves a little something to be desired). He just couldn't watch her live an empty meaningless life in a wheelchair. (No offense to the thousands of courageous people who live very full lives from beds and wheelchairs -- if you haven't climbed to the top of the female boxing world mountain, you just wouldn't understand.) After this heroic murder, Clint goes off into the sunset. I think this is just to set us up for the sequel. You see, Scrap (the Clint character's best friend) has had a pretty empty life as a one-eyed janitor who lives in Clint's gym "cleaning up other people's spit." He needs to die. And Dodger, the desperately sad never-gonna-be wanna-be who is always hanging around the gym, he can't be having a good time -- Clint can take care of that one, too. Finally, Fr. I-Hate-Catholicism-So-Of-Course-I-Became-a-Priest will get the two shots to the back of the head he has been crying out for. Then Clint can take a look in the mirror and realize that all this killing is getting kind of monotonous, not to mention the fact that he is getting really old and is bound to be incapacitated in some way. Hopefully before he offs himself in one final act of courage, he'll pick up a book on the rules of boxing and discover that boxers who sucker punch their opponents after the bell (and after being warned by the ref about dirty moves) are disqualified. Then he can die happy (although probably a little confused as to how he spent his whole life in boxing not hearing about these rule thingeys), knowing that his first victim was a champ.