I am a sucker for great sports movies: Hoosiers (basketball), Rudy, Remember the Titans (football), The Rookie (baseball), Seabiscuit (horse-racing), and Miracle (hockey). And this fall The Greatest Game Ever Played (golf) will hit theatres.
So I was glad to get the opportunity last night to view an advance screening of Cinderella Man, the true story of boxing hero James J. Braddock. Michael Medved says that this movie is "A gorgeous, sentimental, heart-tugging masterpiece. Easily one of the year's best films and one of the better sports movies ever made." I couldn't agree more.
Directed by Ron Howard, "Cinderella Man" stars Russell Crowe as Jim Braddock, Renée Zellweger as his wife, Mae, and Paul Giamatti as trainer Joe Gould.
Crowe delivers an absolutely flawless performance as Braddock, a successful New Jersey boxer who lost all of his money and a string of fights at the beginning of the Great Depression, and who sought to reenter the ring against improbable odds.
I personally don't enjoy reading the whole plotline of a movie before actually watching it, and I suspect you won't either. So I'll save the summary, and just say that I highly recommend it.
I will say that it's rare to see a Hollywood film where virtue and family are held up this highly. There are no illusions that Braddock was a perfect man. But we see portrayed a man who believed in integrity, honesty, and hard work, and who genuinely loved his wife and his children. In fact, I'm not sure that I can think of a film in recent memory that so exalts marital affection and warmth without exploiting our voyeuristic inclinations.
On a scale of four stars, I'd give it four.
Rated PG-13 for intense boxing violence and some language.
