by Cain Noble-Davies
Worth: $17.50
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Sydney Sweeney, Ben Foster, Merritt Wever, Coleman Pedigo, Ethan Embry
Intro:
… hits the sweet spot not just as a properly effective sports flick, but as a cutting statement on the damage inflicted by heteronormative force.
Informed characterisation is one of the worst faults to find in any form of writing. To see or read or hear about a given persona in a story, and all the things that make them them end up being attributes prescribed to them by other characters, or indeed just the text itself. They’re always super interesting, or so we’re told… As much as storytelling is, by design, about telling things to an audience, there’s an incredibly irksome feeling to the notion that a person, even a fictionalised one, can be defined solely by the perspectives of others, rather than by themselves.
Co-writers David Michôd and Mirrah Foulkes, in their cinematic depiction of the life and legacy of boxing pioneer Christy Martin, take hold of that feeling and push it not just towards sports drama but also psychological horror.
Imbued with Sydney Sweeney’s stunning performance, Christy is shown as a fighter in a state of perpetual identity crisis. A young lesbian coming of age in the late-‘80s, her skill and determination in the ring slowly reveals itself as the only true piece of herself that she has left. Everything else, from her wishes to her romances to her treatment of others, is influenced (and later enforced by others), in particular her mother (Merritt Wever) and her trainer-turned-husband James (Ben Foster at his most unrecognisable).
Bobbing and weaving its way through the excellently-realised boxing bouts, with the stunt team led by Michael Jamorski and Walter Garcia giving Sweeney’s commendable willingness to do her own work in the ring the space to flourish, there’s a consistent feeling that more so than physical fighting, the audience is watching a woman fight against the confines of the closet. Against the increasingly-terrifying outbursts of her husband, against the Schrödinger’s hostility that she exhibits towards her fellow competitors (a potent combination of ladder-kicking and heartbreaking self-denial), and against the societal absurdity of making her mark in a traditionally-masculine sport… while still having to play into stereotypical feminine expectations.
Michôd builds on his exploration of the effects of influence, and the importance of protecting and honouring the vulnerable, that has been a regular fixture of his work since his breakout with Animal Kingdom. And from Foulkes, whose Judy & Punch directly fought back against men holding quills who maliciously rewrite the life stories of women, the screenplay here melds with Sweeney’s committed physicality to keep the tragedy of her circumstances at the forefront. It’s almost to the point where the sports drama is the least interesting aspect, as the backstage tension and eventual unleashing into pure, soul-rotting gaslit terror, make the only title worth fighting for to be her own. And it’s through that struggle, that internalised rejection of herself and her own wants, that the moments of compassion and kindness from her few true allies truly land… it may not be a physical punch to the gut, but you’re likely to be winded nonetheless.
Christy is a bruised and beautiful reclamation of personhood. Sweeney and Foster add certified knockouts to their respective stats, while Michôd’s gritty but learned directing approach to the film’s sourest of moments lets the sheer impact come through without making it feel exploitative of a real person’s suffering.
It’s through that empathetic lens, that willingness to show not just individual monsters but societal structures that prop them up, that the film’s conviction in appraising the real Christy, the Christy she herself was long denied, hits the sweet spot not just as a properly effective sports flick, but as a cutting statement on the damage inflicted by heteronormative force.
