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The movie boasts a talented ensemble, telling the true story of Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle, who mentored a brash Yorkshire teenager from Middle Eastern migrant parents. Known as Naseem Hamed, the youngster was taught to stand up to prejudice and transformed into a celebrity world champion in the 1990s. The trainer cultivated his showboating arrogance and powerful punches, but after achieving wealth, the boxer betrayed his coach, excluding him and turning him into a mix of John Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Cast and Characters

Pierce Brosnan plays Ingle; Amir El-Masry takes on the part of Hamed, and Toby Stephens appears as the bullish London promoter Frank Warren, who saw the potential that the coach had discovered.

Where the Movie Falls Short

Yet, the movie frankly lacks the Prince’s fancy footwork: the fight scenes flow well, but the crucial drama between them is repeatedly flat and monotonous. It lacks nuance or light and shade in the depiction of the protagonist himself, and El-Masry, an otherwise outstanding performer, isn’t given the chance to display any subtlety or much of what might make his character truly engaging – although he’s clearly been working out and looks very plausible in the boxing arena.

Problems with Script and Sound

The drama is often lumbered with functional, explanatory dialogue that tell you precisely what is going on and what we are supposed to be thinking (“You started your boxing journey at seven years old …”). It is the sort of script that streaming-TV producers call “double-screen”, making sure you understand what’s going on while you’re viewing the film but also glancing at your device. Additionally, the background music is overpowering, sometimes nearly deafening, particularly in the moment where the boxer gets overexcited calling on the promoter in his luxurious home.

Performances and Key Moments

Although El-Masry and Brosnan do their considerable best, their dynamic doesn’t quite ignites, and the major fight scenes are frequently anticlimactically truncated. The most important scene is certainly when, provoked beyond endurance in the training facility one day by Hamed as a misguided “elder”, the trainer actually offers to step into the ring and fight him. All present in the room is stunned and uneasy. In what way is this insanely unwise confrontation going to unfold? What will be the ending? Surely the Prince is going to kill him? Or will he emotionally pull his punches? The resolution remains ambiguous.

Bright Spots and Comedy

This isn’t to imply that there aren’t some good moments. The actor elicits humor when his character informs a journalist what he’s teaching the youths from his neighborhood: to reject bias and when you encounter a offender, “Punch him in the bollocks”. Amusing too when the boxer fidgets at the ridiculous stunts the coach makes him do in the beginning: acting like the “beast from the Middle East”.

Storyline and Final Thoughts

As for the rift, the movie depicts this as being worsened by a tell-all publication that Ingle is supposed to have written (a plot point clearly modified from prior material), and there is an intriguingly conceived final conversation – however the heartfelt homage that Hamed is reportedly given to Ingle after his death is merely mentioned in the end titles, and not shown on film. There is interesting material here, but the punches don’t land.

The film screened at the London film festival and is available in UK and Irish theaters from January 9.