Watched the first half again two times
Watched the first half again two times
I saw it at the theaters too but watched it again and I watched it again up to the scene where she is knocking out the British champ in the second round twice in the last couple of days. This movie has something special and a simple beauty in it. I really like the Foley when she is fighting in her stride. The sound is very well done and I think it is the little things that add emotional content to the scenes - like the soft sigh her opponent makes when the ref checks to see if she is ok just before she gets knocked out. I wonder if you notice that the stool is a focal point during the first 2/3s of the film. This repetition is a set up for when the assistant puts it in on its side and it is like in music when you set up the final chord in the climax and this one is like the minor triad known as the devil's third, played like a Bach fugue on a pipe organ in a dark C# minor. In fact there is a dark minor chord being played at that moment making us know this is a tragedy unfolding. Up to then Frank puts it under the ropes firmly upright over and over after each knock out and we get a close up of the EverLast brand at one point. (I wondered if that was a product placement ad)
I like the training montage sequence with fade in and fade out of close ups of her working out, doing sit ups, jumping rope, hitting the bags, and while she makes the gradual improvements Frank is watching in the back ground. And then the same kind of rhythm in the office shots and one particularly stood out. While we hear Morgan's deep voice over narrating about how fighters' managers didn't want their fighters knocked out so they had to be paid off and one of the fighters' managers is taking pay off money from across the desk and then instead of a cut, he fades out of the scene so that we just see the empty chair across from Clint Eastwood's desk and then the next fighter's manager fades in to take money. It was coordinated shooting and editing. It is the attention to details that make the scenes deeper and more meaningful. I think Clint reaches out to the audience with a tough love and paternal nature that is true to his life at the time of shooting. I could go on and on about the symbolism and the film's inner communications and definitions. Like the tough love and the comment she makes about herself, "I'm tough" and the words on the wall "tough ain't enough," while Morgan Freeman's voice is heard narrating and guiding us through the workings of the human heart and how fighting is about respect. And how love and having heart alone is not enough. I think there is a message about heart and soul and the power of the human spirit. I think there is something about finding and defining a person's place in life that fits the person. I think it is about being strong through it all to the sweetest victories and successes and at the same time it is about the delicate frailty of life and dreams.
If you have not seen this movie see it ASAP. And, let me know what you think.
