All I can say is that this movie is a masterpiece, pure and simple, deep and true. The story is about an old boxing trainer and a hillbilly girl who has a feeling she can become a boxer. The narrator is a former boxer, and the trainer’s best friend. Here’s an interesting tidbit: it’s not a boxing movie, but more a movie about a boxer. Just like how “Ali” follows Ali’s career down the road, this essentially does the same thing by showing how deep it can go, the emotional power that is flowing throughout the film, this could be the best film that came out that year. I agree with Ebert when he said, “I cannot suggest in this review, because I will not spoil the experience of following this story into the deepest secrets of life and death.”
Eastwood, aka Dirty Harry, plays a trainer named Frankie, who runs a sleazy gym in Los Angeles and when he’s free, he reads poetry. Hilary Swank, another very attractive actress, plays Maggie, who is from Southwest Missouri and has been a waitress since she was 13. The one thing that she can do to escape waitressing for her entire life is boxing.
Otherwise, Maggie says, “I might as well go back home and buy a used trailer and get a deep fryer and some Oreos.” Morgan Freeman plays Scrap, a boxer who was previously trained by Frankie into a match for the heavyweight title. Now he lives in a room inside the gym and also has conversations with Frankie that have twisted through the years. Frankie doesn’t want to train Maggie because he doesn’t train girls, but Scrap is the one who convinces Frankie to at least try Maggie out: “She grew up knowing one thing. She was trash.”
These three characters are seen very clearly and truth, which is something you don’t see very often in movies. Eastwood, who doesn’t carry a spare ounce in his old body, doesn’t have any filling in his own movie: Even during the very emotional final scenes, doesn’t go easy with sentiments, but is goes along with them on the same eye-level, which is what they have to do.
Some directors lose their edge when they get old. Others gain it, learning how to tell a story that has everything essential and nothing else. “Million Dollar Baby” is Eastwood’s 25th film as a director, and his best. Ebert mentioned that, “Yes, "Mystic River" is a great film, but this one finds the simplicity and directness of classical storytelling; it is the kind of movie where you sit very quietly in the theater and are drawn deeply into lives that you care very much about.”
Morgan Freeman is the one who narrates this film, just like how he did with “The Shawshank Redemption,” which this film is exactly like how Scrap describes someone who he has known for a very large part of his life. The voice is flat and truthful: You never hear Scrap going for an affect or putting a spin on his words. He just wants to tell us an autobiography. He walks about how Maggie walked into the gym, how she refused to leave, how Frankie finally said he would train her, and everything after that. Scrap isn’t simply an observer. The film gives him his own life when everyone else is not present. It is about every one of the three protagonists.
Hilary Swank is just amazing in her role as Maggie Fitzgerald. This is a believable character, and reduces her to a fierce intensity. An example is when she is with Scrap at the diner, and Scrap tells her the story how he lost his ability to see with one of this eyes, how Frankie blames himself for not stopping the fight. Ebert admitted, “It is an important scene for Freeman, but I want you to observe how Swank has Maggie do absolutely nothing but listen.” No “reactions,” no nods, no body language except complete stillness, deep attention and a solid look.
I will have to admit: after I saw “The Next Karate Kid,” I didn’t give Hilary Swank a chance because I hated the film that much. Afterwards, when I went to see “Insomnia,” she was just great in that. In this film, she really brings out a great role in Maggie. So I have say that “The Next Karate Kid” wasn’t her fault, it was the people who decided to make that spin-off.
If you remember that scene when Frankie and Maggie are driving at night after visiting Maggie's family where it didn't go so well. Maggie's mother is played by Margo Martindale, who plays this monster that is selfish. Maggie tells Frankie, "I got nobody but you," which is true, but do not think for once that there is a romance going on between these two. It goes deeper than that. She opens up to Frankie and tells her about her father and an old dog, both whom she loved so much.
Look at how the cinematographer, Tom Stern, uses the light in that scene. Instead of the usual “dashboard lights” that somehow light up the entire front seat, what how he has their faces slide in and out of shadow, how sometimes we can’t even see or hear them. Look at how the rhythm of the lighting matches the tone and pacing of the words, as the visuals are embracing the conversation.
This is a dark movie: a lot of shadows, many night scenes, characters who move away into private fates. It is a “boxing movie” by following Maggie’s career and several of her fights. She wins from the beginning, but the point is “Million Dollar Baby” is about a woman with a goal of making something of herself, and a man who doesn’t want to deal with this woman, and finally will.
Paul Haggis, who mostly worked on TV, did the screenplay to this film and earns an Oscar nomination. I believe Swank, Eastwood and Freeman also had Oscar nomination, as did the picture and many technicians – and the original music made by Eastwood, which always does the requirement and is not a distraction.
Ebert noted, “Haggis adapted the story from Rope Burns: Stories From the Corner, a 2000 book by Jerry Boyd, a 70-year-old fight manager who wrote it as "F.X. Toole."” The dialogue is never fancy but poetic. Maggie asks Frankie, “How much she weigh?” She is asking him about the daughter he hasn’t seen in years. “Trouble in my family comes by the pound.” Look at when Frankie sees Scrap’s feet on the desk:
Frankie: “Where are your shoes?”
Scrap: “I’m airing out my feet.”
The foot conversation lasts almost a minute, which displays the film’s patience in reminding character.
Now Eastwood is helpful when it comes to his supporting characters, which help him out in painting the world that brings the realism out of it. What you never see coming is the scenes that Eastwood shares with the Catholic priest, who is simply seen as a good man. Ebert complained, “Movies all seem to put a negative spin on the clergy these days.” Frankie has gone to mass every morning and says his prayers, and Father Horvak, played by Brian F. O’Byrne, says to him that he must be carrying some guilt inside of him, since he has attended daily mass for 23 years, and that usually is the case. Frankie wants some advice from the priest at very serious time, and the priest gives him some wise insight and not church belief: “If you do this thing, you’ll be lost, somewhere so deep you will never find yourself.” Also, pay attention to when Haggis has Maggie use “Frozen,” which uneducated girls may not even utter, but that word expresses what a full paragraph couldn’t.
Movies nowadays seem to pay a lot of more attention to special effects and sensation, but this one is made about three people and what they do expresses who they are and why they are that way. It has to be everything that you would want to express. It’s very character driven, but that’s what makes the film shines since, like I had mentioned before, movies pay way more attention to the action. So definitely give this film a watch, I think you’ll love it as well.
Well, next week is the finale to Morgan Freeman month. Stay tuned and see what I could possibly end this month with.
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