His long and varied career in the
motion picture industry — as actor, writer, director, producer, even composer
— distinguishes Clint Eastwood from most of his peers. Because he runs his
own production company and therefore generally controls almost every element in
the making of his movies, he probably deserves that overused and much abused
title of auteur more than any other filmmaker around. His talents, ambition,
and commitment to his work place him in a unique position in American or even
international cinema.
His independence from the commercial
concerns of financial backers and the artistic timidity of production
executives enables him to make the sorts of movies he believes in, which may
not always equate with high critical praise and great profits. If he made such
box office successes as Sudden Impact and The Outlaw Josey Wales, he also
made such flops as Bronco Billy and Breezy. If he attempted some
unprofitable works, like White Hunter,
Black Heart and Bird, as
courageous acts of personal and artistic homage, he also tried to glorify the
invasion of Grenada with the jingoistic nonsense of Heartbreak Ridge.
His most powerful and significant
pictures, however, have earned him both critical and commercial success and a
long list of honors from many nations. Unforgiven won four Academy Awards, and more recently, Mystic
River, probably the best film of 2003, won a couple of Oscars, though not
all it deserved. Now, his new film, Million
Dollar Baby, which he directed and stars in, though apparently enjoying a
somewhat disappointing early reception, also belongs among the best titles of
what has turned out to be a pretty good year at the movies.
Million
Dollar Baby belongs in the most populous subgenre of sports films, the
boxing flick, with the difference that it deals with a female fighter, Maggie
Fitzgerald (Hilary Swank), pursuing the familiar route to a championship. A
refugee from a trailer trash family in the Ozarks, Maggie, who trains on her
own at the Hit Pit, a gym owned by Frankie Dunn (Eastwood), persuades Dunn to
manage her professional career. The reluctant Dunn, a grizzled veteran known as
the best cut man in the business, instructs her in all aspects of the science
of boxing, and helps her through a series of decisive successes in the ring,
which lead to a climactic and transforming shot at the world championship.
In the tradition of the good sports
films — decidedly a minority — Million
Dollar Baby employs its primary subject as a means to explore other, more
important matters. Dunn’s friend and assistant at the Hit Pit, the former
prizefighter Scrap (Morgan Freeman), supplies, through both his own scenes and
a voiceover narration, the history of their friendship and their mutual
connection to the sport. He also discusses something of the poetry and
philosophy of boxing, providing a running commentary on Maggie’s progress and
Frankie’s personality.
In keeping with the traditions of its
genre, Million Dollar Baby depicts a
number of familiar elements — the process of a fighter’s arduous training,
the visual demonstration of growth in knowledge and skill, the numerous (and
surprisingly brutal) boxing matches. It also mixes both comic and serious
matters essentially unrelated to boxing that define the personalities of its
principals — the squalor of Maggie’s background, Frankie’s daily theological
quarrels with his parish priest, his humorously testy relationship with Scrap,
and Scrap’s genuine kindness and wisdom.
The relatively simple and familiar
story of a hungry fighter’s dream of success in the ring takes on additional
meanings in the growing relationship between Frankie and Maggie. After
realizing the greed and selfishness of her family, she understands that Frankie
resembles the father she had loved and lost, while Frankie finds in her a
substitute for the daughter from whom he has been estranged for many years. Their
relationship and its ultimately tragic outcome constitute the real subject of
the film.
The understated performances of
Eastwood and Freeman, who absolutely inhabit their parts, constitute a useful
background and context for the rather more energetic and emphatic acting of
Hilary Swank. Both separately and together, all three work extremely well, but
poor Hilary Swank really doesn’t have a chance on the same screen with those
guys; they assert their presence with a glance, a minor change of expression, a
slight variation in vocal pitch, and simply take most of the scenes away from
her.
The movie suffers from some slow
pacing and repetition, but handles its boxing scenes with considerable
conviction. Hilary Swank and her opponents fight far more skillfully and
viciously than the female boxers who now and then appear on television, which
may, alas, inspire other young women to enter a sport in which the object
remains the disablement of one’s opponent. Its story, its actors, and its
significant emotional content, however, make Million Dollar Baby one of the best and most unusual boxing movies
in years and a powerful film in its own right, a significant addition to the
Eastwood canon.
Million Dollar Baby(PG-13), starring Clint Eastwood,
Hilary Swank, Morgan Freeman, Lucia Rijker; screenplay by Paul Haggis; based on
a short story from Rope Burns by F.
X. Toole; directed by Clint Eastwood.
This article appears in Jan 26 – Feb 1, 2005.
