The Fighter..............

Firstly although I think it is one of the best boxing films I've seen (and I have seen alot, I currently have 83 'boxing films'), its not my favourite.

For me the final Rocky film is by far my favourite.

Its very moving, ties up the whole saga brilliantly, and I think its the best performance of Stallone's career; the fight itself is superbly filmed, and if anyone has seen the documentary on the making of the film you will see just how 'realistic' much of it was, Stallone even got knocked down for real and this made it into the final cut.

Likewise 'The Fighter' has a great making of documentary, and it was after watching it that I had a true appreciation of the film.

The lead actor (Mark Wahlberg) trained for literally years for the role, and I think he bears a striking resemblance to Mikey Ward, and this is very clear in the documentary in the scenes where he discusses the role with the 'real' Ward.

The makers of the film admit that they had to make some alterations to the story for dramatic purposes, but is clear that the two brothers were very much involved in its making.

As to the Gatti fights I agree that I too was a little surprised (and disappointed) when the film ended with the Neary fight; but the documentary explains that the Neary win was the most important one to his family and his local community, and although he went on to gain his legendary status fighting Gatti they said because he lost the last fight of the trilogy the makers didn't want to end the film in that way. They do mention the Gatti fights in the end credits, and there is also a short clip of the real life brothers discussing the film, it is remarkable how alike the actors were.

I like 'Raging Bull', but I've personally always thought it is a little over rated, and in my experience alot of people say its the best boxing film ever made without ever having watched it properly!

 

I'm a big fan of 'The Great White Hope', a superb film about Jack Johnson (although it never mentions the name Jack Johnson) that has a young and trim James Earl Jones in the lead role.

There is a famous photo of James Earl Jones with Muhammad Ali from during the time it was a play (prior to it becoming a film), they are pretending to spar each other.

 

I noticed that!

Apart from that he did look alot like him thogh, and in the fight itself there were moments when you could hardly tell the difference.:bbb

 

Great film! :happy

I like just about anything Wesley Snipes does; I actually have the film on a 'Cinema Club' VHS!

Its another of those films I've got but haver never got around to watching, don't know why because I've heard its very good! :good