★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Acting heavyweight Jake Gyllenhaal throws himself into
another transformative role as boxing champion Billy Hope in Antoine Fuqua’s Southpaw. When Hope’s winning streak is
marred by a terrible incident that robs him of his wife (Rachel McAdams) and
his willingness to win, he turns to old dog Willis (Forest Whitaker) to help
him get back in the ring not for a shot at vengeance, but to make himself whole
in the eyes of his daughter (Oona Laurence).
When it comes to boxing movies, there is a certain amount of
cliché that audiences are willing to accept – thanks mostly to the enormous
popularity of the Rocky series – in terms
of the narrative structure, and it’s with no surprise that a great deal of Southpaw slips comfortably into the
mould. That being said, for at least the first hour (as Hope slides into a
downward spiral of self-loathing) there’s some quite stark and nicely brutal
stuff on display; the scenes between our hero and his daughter Leila (wonderfully
played by Laurence) are often more painful than the blows Hope endures in the
ring.
Gyllenhaal is aiming slightly below his weight here,
bringing his usual gusto to a film that really doesn’t have to demand that much
of him. Billy Hope is a creased, coiled ball of nihilistic energy; the utter
reverse of Nightcrawler’s Lou Bloom,
although it and Southpaw are arguably
character studies, with the latter eschewing glamourous camera-work for a
handheld, down-in-the-dirt affair. The camera shudders and rocks with the
punches, occasionally transitioning to TV-style formats during the big matches
then shifts back to still, flat angles for the side-lines.
All of this is under-laid by music by the late composer
James Horner, and it serves as yet another reminder why his loss is so great for
those who love film scores. His idiosyncratic brass and drums are almost
entirely knocked out in favour of gentle piano and anguished strings, a
surprising choice in experimentation that doubly pays off during Hope’s prepping
for battle and the heart-rending
interactions with his daughter.
So while the film is clearly technically sound, the
supporting performances and general narrative thrust leave much to be desired. If
you pause the film the very second that Forest Whitaker shows up as Mr. every
grizzled mentor character ever, the entire audience could tell you how the
remainder of the story will pan out. Whitaker fails to raise his role above its
cliché roots, and even the always capable Rachel McAdams looks like she’s there
to tick a box on the ‘heroes journey’ checklist.
Southpaw is
entertaining and more than a little enthralling when it divulges from formulaic
one-two-punches, but it would have worked better as a condensed, 90-minute ball
of raw energy than the deflated, two-hour stumble down a well-trod path that it
ultimately becomes.
