Review: Southpaw

Half-way through the new Antoine Fuqua film Southpaw, Forrest Whitaker is introduced as a potential trainer for main character Billy Hope, a transformative performance by Jake Gyllenhaal. This is the true start of the film. It is a shame that the filmmakers wait so long to get these two in the ring together because they sizzle against on another.

In the film's overlong first half, Billy and his wife Maureen, Rachel McAdams, are at the top of his career, just winning an important match. Both of them are foster children who understand the system well. This comes up a lot later on as Billy fights to keep his own daughter out of the system.

The opening fight sequence is wonderfully shot and wholly convincing. It is too bad that we wait until the end of the film to get in the ring again.  At the end of the fight as Billy and Maureen are leaving, a rival fighter named Miguel Escobar taunts him. The two brawl in the middle of a hotel lobby until a gunshot breaks things up. It soon becomes clear that Maureen has been shot and she dies suddenly.

This leaves Billy in tatters and he slowly destroys himself, his career and his relationship with his daughter. This is where Fuqua's heavy hand with the melodrama ruins the film. He wallows in Billy's misery for close to an hour before Billy decides to get his life and daughter back.

Whitaker hasn't been this good in a long time and Gyllenhaal is on a winning streak. The two almost make Southpaw worth recommending. However too often the film wallows in melodrama, denying us the excitement of boxing. I mean, shouldn't I be able to understand the maneuver southpaw at the end of a film called Southpaw?

3/5