Girlfight

It is probably not fair to blame the whole thing on Sylvester Stallone, but it is tempting. After all, there were movies about underdogs long before 1976’s Best Picture Academy Award winner “Rocky,” but something about that picture seemed to legitimize the notion that a movie about building character by struggling against overwhelming odds could pay off big at the box office. Actually, I like Stallone, and I admire the career he has carved out for himself (I’m even willing to forgive him for “Get Carter”), but since “Rocky” we have been inundated with Rocky-like stories of football teams, baseball teams, hockey teams, Little League teams, runners, racers of every description, cops, robbers, teachers, artists, financiers, you name it. Now, in what has to be considered an example of coming full circle, we have “Girlfight,” the Rocky-like story of, well, a boxer. (Which reminds me of the perhaps apocryphal story about an aspiring writer who tried to pitch a movie idea by saying. “It’s like 'Die Hard,' only set in a building.”) Of course, in “Girlfight” the boxer is a woman, and the stakes have a lot less to do with money and glory than with battling her past, her circumstances, and her own unchanelled rage.

Newcomer Michelle Rodriguez plays the protagonist Diana, and she commands the screen from the moment we see her, standing in the hall at high school, glaring straight ahead as the other students walk past. It is obvious from that moment that she is angry, at the world, at life, probably at herself. She picks fights with classmates, more, it seems, for a lack of anything better to do than out of any real sense of conviction. She is clearly one of those troubled kids who are headed straight for oblivion. Then one day, her father asks her to run an errand to the gym where her brother is taking boxing lessons. Diana, from the minute she enters the dank, dark club, is hooked on the vibe, and she knows at once that she wants to fight. She manages to convince Hector (a convincing Tirelli) that she is willing to make a commitment to boxing, and he reluctantly agrees to train her. Diana has to beg, borrow, and steal money for her lessons. The marketing tag line for the picture is “Prove them wrong,” and Diana must do just that, demonstrating to her friends and her family that she has what it takes to fight.

Though skeptical at first, the gym regulars are willing to look past gender and give her a chance. The most unlikely of feminists, they ultimately judge her on her heart and her skill. For the first time, Diana has found something she can commit to, something that absorbs her completely. She does not mind the pain, the beatings; indeed, she seems to thrive on them, taking strength from the strength that is expended upon her. She wears her bruises and black eyes like medals. First time writer-director Karyn Kusama takes what could easily have been a formula piece of genre work and manages to draw something more out of it. The rough edges of a first timer are there, to be sure, but Kusama has a fine eye for the grimy Brooklyn environs, and a good sense of pacing. She draws compelling performances from her actors, especially Rodriguez. Rodriguez, a complete unknown before landing this role, inhabits the character fully. She has a striking face, with her dark slashes of eyebrows above the angry stare, which can soften to beauty at times.

There are those times, of course, because Diana meets another aspiring fighter, Adrian (Douglas) (and I somehow cannot believe it is coincidence that the love interests of the main characters in both “Girlfight” and “Rocky” are named Adrian), and they are immediately drawn to each other. Their love affair amidst the grit of their working class world and their gym is compelling yet desperate, as if they both know there are few chances for grace in their lives, so they had better make the most of those that do appear. Adrian and Diana are forced to confront a real impediment to their relationship, though. They have to fight each other in the ring. First they just spar in practice, but then, in a development that is one of the two miscalculations in the script (the other being the overripe back story of Diana’s family), they must battle each other in a championship bout. Their trainers had told them all along that in the ring they must forget what they mean to each other, and they struggle to reconcile that need with their emotional attachment. The blows inflicted by both partners are a sign, not of contempt, but of mutual respect. In this world, love means never having to say I’m sorry I hit you.

Kusama plays it straight, though, never loading more onto the story than it can handle. There are no riches, no prizes, at the end of the championship, nor at the end of the film, and I very much doubt a sequel is planned, let alone five. There is not even a sense of assurance that either of these two kids will escape their dead-end lives. There is only hard-won self respect, and a brief moment of satisfaction, and a certain kind of truth about these people, in all their unvarnished glory. (10/22/2000)