Antoine Fuqua’s “Southpaw” tells the story of fictitious lightweight boxer Billy Hope. The film follows his life from utter turmoil to eventual triumph. It’s a tough and gritty story, but that doesn’t make it a good one, and it certainly can’t save the movie from its detestable cast of characters and blunt, predictable themes.
Namely, the problem with “Southpaw” is Billy Hope himself (played by Jake Gyllenhaal). Gyllenhaal's performance isn’t the problem — he’s a stellar actor who creates a believable character. The problem is, I didn’t want to believe in Hope.
Hope begins the movie as the reigning World Light Heavyweight boxing champion. He lives in a multimillion-dollar home with his beautiful wife Maureen and their stereotypically perfect daughter Leila. This is no “Rocky.” Hope has it made.
Maybe that’s part of the problem, because Hope is also an arrogant, whiny brat, and when things don’t go his way, he punches them into submission. A lot. In one of the earlier scenes in the movie we see Hope sitting in his pristine granite-tiled bathroom throwing a fit because he has to speak at a charity gala for the orphanage that raised him. He cries a little and slams his fists against the wall because he just doesn’t want to do it. Hope is clearly leading a difficult life.
It’s just impossible to feel sympathy or to empathize with Hope. For example, Hope’s wife is killed at the charity gala of circumstance could have been avoided had Hope decided not to punch an antagonistic competitor.
The worst thing about “Southpaw,” though, is that Hope never evolves as a character. He goes through a period of turmoil when his wife dies and he loses his six-story house and twelve cars along with custody of his child. Usually, at this point in the narrative the protagonist would change his ways, become a better man and right his wrongs accordingly.
Hope doesn’t. Hope adds a few new tricks to his boxing repertoire, the southpaw being one of them, and then through a single fight Hope punches his way back to the top of Heavyweight boxing and gets his old self-absorbed lifestyle back. There’s no catharsis, but at least he has his house. Violence really can solve everything.
What good there is in “Southpaw” lies in the details. There’s some really cool cinematography, especially of the fight scenes, which are full of quick, dynamic shots and were a real adrenaline rush to watch, even though I might have been rooting for Hope to lose.
Eminem offers his trademark sports-movie magic with his song “Phenomenal” backing the stereotypical boxing training montage. It’s a stellar hype song and matches the feel of the action perfectly.
Gyllenhaal’s acting is also superb, and he does a great job of making the neurotic Hope as real as possible. The rest of the acting from Forest Whitaker as Hope’s trainer and Rachel McAdams as Hope’s wife isn’t bad either.
Unfortunately though, none of this is enough to distract us from Billy Hope — the most unlikeable, obnoxious character I’ve seen in a movie in a long time. “Southpaw” had the potential to be a decent, feel-good boxing flick, but honestly, you’d probably get more enjoyment out of punching the DVD when it comes out. At least, that’s what Billy Hope would do.
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