A-List: Five Best Boxing Movies
By J. Don Birnam
November 26, 2015
BoxOfficeProphets.com
I’m not a big fan of the genre overall, but it seems that there are many legendary movies that have focused on men beating each other up. Perhaps it is the way that sports movie heroism can be reduced to individual achievement in boxing matches that is most appealing. By my count, three movies that center on a sport have won Best Picture - and two of them feature boxing, both of which we will discuss later today. (The third is Chariots of Fire).
The rule is pretty simple: if the movie has a boxer as a main character, then it is eligible. This year, it wasn’t only Creed that added itself to the genre, but Jake Gyllenhaal’s mostly unsuccessful Southpaw also sought to make some noise. One could mention David O. Russell’s Best Picture nominee, The Fighter, as deserving of a spot, but to me it seemed like everyone was trying to out-act each other and out-fake accent each other. The Academy, of course, disagreed and gave the otherwise deserving Christian Bale and Melissa Leo acting Oscars. Denzel Washington’s The Hurricane, which chronicles the story of a New Jersey boxer wrongly convicted of a triple murder, is a solid flick but does not really center around boxing itself.
Finally, one has to give some consideration to Paul Newman’s Somebody Up There Likes Me. The 1956 drama is based on the life of legendary Boxer Rocky…uh, Barbella. Newman does what he does best - portrays the troubled, misunderstood anti-hero, but the movie is somewhat dialed in with predictable twists and outcome.
5. Ali (2001). Today making a serious push at a Best Actor nod for portraying a real-life doctor who discovered issues relating to head injuries in the NFL, Will Smith first showed his more serious acting talents way back when he portrayed the title character in the acclaimed boxing movie, Ali, for which, in fact, he received his first Academy nomination. Based in part on the must-see Muhammad Ali/George Foreman documentary When We Were Kings, the strongest part of the film is the performances of both Smith and Jon Voight, who convince you of their originality throughout. At the very least, the movie is an interesting exploration of the enigmatic boxer, from his conversion to Islam to his role in the Vietnam War. The film then also effectively places Ali in the broader context of his time, taking us through the assassinations of Malcom X and Martin Luther King, Jr. and their effect on the title character. In the end, a solid, stoic portrayal educates us while it mostly thrills us, and one definitely cannot help but root for the guy in the end.
4. The Champ (1931). Before the Production Code washed away the violence and booze from motion pictures, the today little-known boxing movie The Champ wowed audiences with its big heart and the now-familiar story of the everyday man trying to make it. In The Champ, the lead is a washed up, alcoholic and gambling heavyweight boxer who is tasked with caring for his son. Ups and downs punctuate the narrative, as the Champ mostly disappoints the child (who is eventually forced back to live with a mother that didn’t want him and that he didn’t love), until the somewhat overwrought finale where the Champ redeems himself once and for all.
Now dated, this movie is memorable because it set the stage for what is the literal and metaphorical point of so many boxing movies today - fight the system, fight your demons, redeem yourself. The fight is inherently personal, it cannot be shared, but it affects all those around you. The ring is life itself, and whether you thrive in it, or die in it, that is the place where all will be defined. That is the story of The Champ, which one sees over and over again in boxing movies to this day.
3. Rocky (1976). Without question the most successful boxing franchise of all time, Rocky is obviously a great boxing movie, even setting aside my own distaste for the facile, hero-worship ploy of the narrative. Indeed, this week’s Creed is considered a Rocky sequel, as Stallone plays the beloved Rocky Balboa once more (and he’s making a serious push for a Best Supporting Actor nomination), who is now training the grandson of his legendary opponent, Apollo Creed.
But back to 1976. The song. The scene with the steps. The love story. The unexpected ending. The movie Rocky was and remains a cultural phenomenon, sweeping audiences away with its underdog story, the good guy who you have to root for. Formulaic and trite, if you ask me, but there is no doubt that the formula works if you are into it. Like other movies today (think, The Martian), the hero is too irresistible, if one dimensional, to not be a part of the conversation. And, admittedly, there is value in that too - there is value in that story of success through trying, of triumph through perseverance, of winning by losing, and of conquering all through will power.
Okay, I admit it, I’m taken in too. Its Best Picture win over other legendary, dark movies like Taxi Driver and Network still sting, but Rocky is without a doubt an American timeless classic.
2. Million Dollar Baby (2004). For the longest time, I had a complicated relationship with the other Best Picture Oscar winner that featured boxing, Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby. The plot seemed manipulative to an extreme, setting you up for a big high to be followed by a great low.
But all that aside, when viewed from a distance, the movie is a great triumph of moviemaking. Hillary Swank’s performance is that moving, and Morgan Freeman turns in one of the best of his career. Consider also that a movie about a female boxer was no easy task, and that Clint Eastwood did what he did best both as the curmudgeonly old trainer, but also as the seasoned director who knows how to weave effectively between fighting shots and dramatic close-ups.
The ending is legendary and suffers from none of the sodding banalities that litter Rocky and make it seem like a Disneyland ride. Million Dollar Baby is a boxing movie - triumphs, tragedy, perseverance, heroism - but it is really a human story movie. The desires to follow one’s calling and the tragedy that can cruelly befall it transcend boxing, as both are so strong in this movie that they haunt whatever endeavor it is we long for.
1. Raging Bull (1980). Million Dollar Baby is head and shoulders above the rest of the boxing movie competition. But when it comes to the best boxing movie of all time, I doubt there would ever be any serious debate or dispute that Martin Scorsese’s masterpiece, Raging Bull, it the unanimous winner.
It’s hard to tell if it’s Robert De Niro’s timeless performance, Thelma Schoonmaker’s precise and jarring editing, the Italian-sounding soundtrack, or Scorsese’s careful directorial style itself, but the movie is now considered one of the greatest American masterpieces of all time.
The story is that of Jake LaMotta, now an aging comedian qua boxer who reflects on the triumphs and tragedies of his life. His brother, a chilling Joe Pesci (presaging his stunning performance a decade later in Goodfellas), has mafia connections, and his girl Vickie is as much a headache as a revelation. But where Rocky is saccharine, Ali is exposition, and where The Champ is groundbreaking, Raging Bull is simply unforgiving. Hope gives space to despair, love gives way to bitterness and, in the end, Scorsese does what only he could pull off - evokes the legendary “I could have been a contender” speech by Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront to brilliantly capture the anxiety of the man and of the era.
The bull raging inside LaMotta raged hard and took him to incredible heights, but was also the source of his destruction. His life was in shambles by his own hand, just like the trite boxer who succeeds constructs his own triumph. It is easier (in reality) and harder (for a filmmaker), however, to portray a devastating result, then the uplifting spirit that one has come to expect from boxing movies.
You won’t find that in Raging Bull.