Southpaw

Poor Jake Gyllenhaal, the guy is actually a fairly decent actor, but the problem is that he stars in way too many movies that are either too dark, too indie, or too gay to get the kind of recognition that he deserves. And it’s because of this that he will probably never win an Oscar or even a Golden Globe while he’s still in the prime of his career.

I thought he should have at least been nominated for his chilling portrayal of the ambitious Louis Bloom in Nightcrawler but apparently letting people die so your story will lead the ten o’clock news was too dark for the Academy (even though they killed Cuba Gooding Jr.’s career by letting him dance on stage for 10 minutes after he won). Also he was great in Donnie Darko but you can’t talk about having sex with Smurfs and expect to get an Oscar nod; yet another clear indication of what’s wrong with that award. And lastly you can’t allow some guy to spit in his hand right before he enters you (Brokeback Mountain) and expect an old rich white man in Hollywood to watch that in the privacy of his home unless there’s coke and Halloween masks involved.

So I went into Southpaw hoping that this would finally be his chance to firmly break his way into the A-lister group of male actors in Hollywood, and depending upon whether or not the public chooses to ignore the opinions of snooty critics and decides to go see the movie anyway, this could actually be his chance. See, most critics get hung up with their belief that every achievement in cinema has to be groundbreaking, when in reality all people are really looking for is something that will move them; and Southpaw does exactly that!

The opening fighting scene will temporarily take most boxing enthusiasts out of the movie because of a few inaccuracies but these same goofs will fly over the heads of most casual fans. And the good thing is, you will see why that scene was so over the top later on in the movie and it will wind up making perfect sense. As a matter of fact, it really couldn’t have been filmed any other way given the context of Billy Hope’s (Gyllenhaal) character and his personality.

In the movie’s outset, Hope is the lightweight champion of the world and he has everything going for him as he has a beautiful wife who he met in an orphanage when they were younger and he has a smart and energetic (thankfully not annoying) little girl who loves him to death. But he is getting older and the end of his career is right around the corner, which is something that he is not even close to being prepared for. Well one day something tragic happens to his wife and his life begins to unravel, and as a result, he winds up getting suspended from boxing and is forced to start from the ground up all over again.

Now the first half of the movie felt like an alternate take on Rocky V to me but without all of the "cool" street fighting scenes with Sly Stallone, but as the movie went on it took on more of the feel of a Karate Kid movie as they even threw in a pseudo Miyagi move for Billy to break out later on if needed.

Sure this movie wasn’t all that original but director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day) made it work. He is a master of showing people at the lowest point in their lives but he also has the ability to show them rise to the challenge and overcome it in dramatic and entertaining fashion. There are plenty of moments that pull at your heartstrings in this movie, so much so that people were openly and audibly crying in the theater!

But by the end, people were cheering and rooting for Billy like he was a family member of theirs; I haven’t experienced anything like that since I saw Rocky 4 (really the best Rocky movie of them all) in the theater. It also helps that real life play by play announcer Jim Lampley takes the boxing scenes up another notch with his commentary; you experience for yourself why he’s been doing this for decades.

Both Gyllenhaal and Forest Whitaker are amazing in this film but even if they had cast Jim Carrey as Billy, Whitaker could have honestly carried this movie by himself. That however shouldn’t take away from what Gyllenhaal did as he superb as the troubled and down on his luck boxer.

Every good Kung fu film follows the same formula: a man’s life is turned upside down by some tragic event caused by another man, man puts his life back together to seek revenge, and man gets revenge with some awesome Kung fu thrown in for entertainment. We all know what’s going to happen but we don’t care because we are all cathartically living through that character, and Southpaw is no different.

I rate this movie as FRESH!