The Sweet Science

The sports movie formula is a recipe like any other, get the right ingredients and task a competent cook to mix it all together and the result is always enjoyable, often exceptional. Every so often, the ingredients are so right and the cook so skilled that the finished product is something truly enduring, but enough culinary metaphors, I'm talking about fight films.

Rocky wasn't really about boxing, it was about an individuals struggle to be more than he was, a triumph over adversity fable about the underdog giving all he could get. This year's The Fighter saw Mark Wahlberg try to balance family and romance with a failing boxing career presided over by his junkie brother, played by an emaciated Christian Bale. The Fighter works so well because, like Rocky, it isn't really about the sport, it's about the fighting outside the ring, the plight of a blue collar Joe trying to find meaning and purpose. Sport's movies work best when the sport takes a back seat to the lives of the competitors, and that's the reason that Warrior is one of the best sport's movies ever made.

Centring on two estranged brothers, separated by an abusive upbringing and thrown back together as they compete in UFC contest Sparta, Warrior is about wrestling with personal demons inside and outside the ring. Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton are in many ways the flipside of the sports movie genre, Brendan (Edgerton) is the plucky underdog whose every victory is an uplifting, fist pumping experience, hes a nice guy and you want him to win, his fights are the longest and most generic. Tommy (Hardy) is a brooding font of animalistic rage, outside the ring he stalks around like a shark, waiting for his next prey and inside he destroys any opponent instantly, no room for showing off, no bang or bluster, he is the antithesis of the pugilistic hero.
It's obvious from the outset that these two will face each other in battle, but the build up is handled so deftly that waiting for them to clash becomes almost unbearable. It's a testament to both actors that a heated conversation on a beach has more tension and electricity than the final showdown in the ring.

The fights themselves are brutal and realistic, making MMA seem like a credible arena for an emotional drama (something which Never Back Down failed to do), but it's the performances that are most memorable.  Nick Nolte gives a career affirming turn as the reformed alcoholic father of Tommy and Brendan, a man that is punished throughout for his past transgressions, his torture seems deserved, but his plight is still heartbreaking.
Warrior is a sports movie like any other, but it's one of those exceptional, enduring experiences that sets itself apart from the rest of the pack to offer a truly unique experience.