🔗 Share this article

This film features a talented cast, telling the real-life tale of Irish boxing trainer Ingle, who guided a cheeky Sheffield teenager from Middle Eastern migrant parents. Known as Naseem Hamed, the fighter was taught to confront racist bullies and transformed into a media-friendly world champion in the late 90s. Ingle cultivated his flamboyant arrogance and lethal fists, but after achieving wealth, the boxer betrayed his coach, cutting him out and making him a mix of Falstaff and Danny Rose.

Cast and Characters

Pierce Brosnan plays Ingle; Amir El-Masry takes on the role of the prince, and Toby Stephens appears as the assertive London promoter Frank Warren, who saw the goldmine that the coach had uncovered.

Film’s Shortcomings

Yet, the movie honestly lacks the fighter’s agility: the fight scenes flow well, but the all-important drama between them is repeatedly dull and monotonous. It lacks nuance or light and shade in the portrayal of the protagonist himself, and the actor, an otherwise excellent talent, isn’t given the chance to display any subtlety or much of what might make his character truly engaging – even though he’s clearly been training and appears convincing in the ring.

Dialogue and Music Issues

The drama is repeatedly burdened by utilitarian, explanatory dialogue that tell you exactly what is happening and what we are meant to feel (“Your journey began your career at age seven …”). It is the kind of dialogue that digital executives call “second-screen”, making sure you understand what’s going on while you’re watching the movie but also checking your device. Additionally, the background music is overbearing, sometimes nearly overwhelming, especially in the moment where the boxer gets overexcited calling on Warren in his palatial home.

Performances and Key Moments

While the leads do their very best, their dynamic doesn’t quite comes to life, and the major boxing moments are often anticlimactically truncated. The most important moment is surely when, goaded beyond endurance in the training facility one day by Hamed as a delusional “old man”, Ingle actually offers to get in the ring and box him. All present in the gym is shocked and uneasy. In what way is this extremely unwise standoff going to unfold? How precisely the ending? Surely the champion is going to defeat him? Or will he sentimentally pull his punches? It’s not clear.

Bright Spots and Comedy

That’s not to say that there are no some nice jabs. Brosnan elicits humor when his character informs a journalist what he’s teaching the kids from his neighborhood: to reject prejudice and when you meet a offender, “Punch him in the bollocks”. It’s funny too when the boxer squirms at the silly antics the coach makes him do in the beginning: acting like the “monster from the East”.

Storyline and Final Thoughts

As for the rift, the film depicts this as being worsened by a tell-all publication that Ingle is supposed to have authored (a plot point evidently adapted from another source), and there is an intriguingly imagined last discussion – however the emotional tribute that the boxer is supposed to have paid to his mentor after his passing is merely mentioned in the closing credits, and not shown on film. There is interesting material in this film, but the punches don’t land.

Giant screened at the London film festival and is available in UK and Irish theaters from 9 January.