Review of Cinderella Man (2005) by Shinta P — 20 Jan 2010

Just watched this for the second time. I can't believe I would say this about a movie directed by Ron Howard and written (in part) by Akiva "Batman and Robin" Goldsman, but this is the best boxing movie ever.

First a note about Ron Howard. I think he's an average to weak director. Visually showing what a character is thinking using fancy computer graphics -- as he does in A Beautiful Mind and The Da Vanci Code -- is a gimmicky, distracting, crutch. There is none of that in Cinderella Man, thankfully.

This is a boxing movie that features tons of actual boxing. Are you listening, Rocky movies (the Rocky movies each have about 2-3 fights, one of which is usually 90% montage)? Braddock has a total of six bouts. Some we see less of than others, but we see a good amount of all of them -- enough to get an idea of how they went down. In addition, they are all memorable and distinct from the others.

What really makes all the fights interesting is Paul Giamatti as Braddock's trainer, Joe Gould. Joe's knowledge of boxing and strategizing with Braddock help the viewer understand what's going on and add excitement and emotion. Overall, Giamatti's character is one of the best parts of the film.

When this movie came out I originally refused to see it because I read that its portrayal of Braddock's nemesis, Max Baer, is inaccurate and downright slanderous. That is still my biggest problem with the movie. The writers clearly made Baer into a caricature of who he was in real life in order to make audiences hate him and to raise the stakes of the Braddock-Baer fight. Cinematically, it works really well. The movie Baer is contemptible and even frightening, and as a viewer you want nothing more than to see him defeated. However, that doesn't justify slandering a real person who's children are still living and were hurt by the inaccurate portrayal of their father as a psychopath. The movie loses one star because of that.