A boxer gets out of prison, professes his love to his teenage sweetheart, and gets back in the ring to open up a gym for kids. This is a slow, but effective sports drama full or Irish swearing and wonderful performances. Apparently Daniel Day Lewis got so good at boxing in preparation for the role, his professional trainer said he could have competed for a professional league. And you can tell he took some punches for the film and he couples that with an awesome, restraint performance which is no surprise. Emily Watson deserves some props as well for balancing DDL's calm acting with something more tender.
If you like romance dramas this may be your cup of tea. I especially liked the soundtrack in this for the more emotional scenes. The weakest parts have to be mainly due to the script. Some characters forgive too quickly, others don't do anything, and others are just in service to the plot and don't feel real. Jim Sheridan's other two collaborations with DDL were obsetively better and I think it's due to the strength of the script for those respective films. I would've liked to have seen the boxer show the inner workings of Danny's life more to add to his character and realism, but alas, we focus a majority of the runtime on a romance that works due to the chemistry of the leads, but overstays it's welcome just a tad for my taste.
If you like romance dramas this may be your cup of tea. I especially liked the soundtrack in this for the more emotional scenes. The weakest parts have to be mainly due to the script. Some characters forgive too quickly, others don't do anything, and others are just in service to the plot and don't feel real. Jim Sheridan's other two collaborations with DDL were obsetively better and I think it's due to the strength of the script for those respective films. I would've liked to have seen the boxer show the inner workings of Danny's life more to add to his character and realism, but alas, we focus a majority of the runtime on a romance that works due to the chemistry of the leads, but overstays it's welcome just a tad for my taste.