![]() ![]() ![]() and lacking in any ounce of charm that I actually found it hard to root for her. The goal in mind is clearly to paint a no-holds-barred portrait of a woman trying to claw her way back into life, but the approach is so heavy-handed that it bludgeons any chance of really connecting to Jackie through her story. Fights occur out of nowhere as if to say, “Now is about a good time for them to argue,” and only moves the plot forward in terms of moving Jackie from one location to another and leaving someone behind. With a script that features rudimentary shouting matches with no depth being unearthed from anyone, Berry’s approach is to then hammer the emotional beats so harshly it borders between exhausting and downright fantasy. There’s the abusive boyfriend (Adan Canto) the verbally/emotionally abusive mother (Adriane Lenox) the son she’s struggling to connect with (Danny Boyd Jr.) the trainer who becomes her major support system (Sheila Atim) and plot points driven by a big argument or upheaval that shows, yes, life is certainly a struggle for her. With a script by Michelle Rosenfarb, Br uised takes every cliche from the sports movie and gritty “human in chaos” drama and mashes it all together to bring out the greatest hits. If that sounds like it could be any sports movie, that’s because it basically is. Coinciding with the return of her young son into her life, she tries to give it all one more shot and get back into the ring. That’s all until one night she’s able to prove she’s still got what it takes to throw down after headbutting a woman twice her size into oblivion. Now, she’s cleaning toilets with no prospects on the horizon, lost, and with only her alcoholic boyfriend/manager for company. A mixed-martial arts drama that’s double duty for star and first-time feature director Halle Berry spends well over two hours trying so desperately to be a brutal drama that tries to encompass so many hardships and emotional struggles with such ferocity and over-blown sentimentality, it’s like being locked in a cage and being wailed on by a fighter named Oscar Bait McGregor.īerry plays Jackie Justice, a former MMA star on the rise who is now at her lowest after suffering an embarrassing defeat. The stylistic choices and belligerent insistence that you really get what the filmmakers are trying to do are like having blows rained down upon you without ceasing. REVIEW: Every now and again you come across movies that certainly aren’t good, aren’t quite horrendous, but are simply one long headache. PLOT: An MMA fighter who has fallen from grace begins to pick up the pieces of her life after her estranged son re-enters the picture. ![]()
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