I liked it once I quieted the voice inside my head asking why is this a movie. There's not enough to carry a 30 for 30 doc though the pluses were enough for me. The first thing I checked after walking out the theater is if Benny Safdie is recently divorced because this is a divorced guys movie.
Clearly the creators of the original documentary set out to make the type of typical sports story that you seemingly desire with this review. Of course, a documentary is real life, or at least close to it, so we are left with nothing other than depressing reality. That is what makes this film an odd choice. The story itself is not particularly interesting and certainly not inspiring. The documentary excels, because it is such a departure from the formulas and motifs of triumphant functional sports tales. As a non-documentary film, the movie leaves the viewer feeling a sort of blasé that can fully achieved by living in the depressing hellscape of 2025.
I think it also helped the documentary that while PRIDE was holding tournaments with 50,000 spectators in the Tokyo Dome with main event purses reaching hundreds of thousands of dollars per fight the world of Mixed Martial Arts fighting was strange and mysterious in the United States in 2002....so the doc was also a peek into a relatively unknown world.
I liked it once I quieted the voice inside my head asking why is this a movie. There's not enough to carry a 30 for 30 doc though the pluses were enough for me. The first thing I checked after walking out the theater is if Benny Safdie is recently divorced because this is a divorced guys movie.
Actually, the documentary upon which this is based, is pretty good. Also a bit longer than 30 minutes.
Clearly the creators of the original documentary set out to make the type of typical sports story that you seemingly desire with this review. Of course, a documentary is real life, or at least close to it, so we are left with nothing other than depressing reality. That is what makes this film an odd choice. The story itself is not particularly interesting and certainly not inspiring. The documentary excels, because it is such a departure from the formulas and motifs of triumphant functional sports tales. As a non-documentary film, the movie leaves the viewer feeling a sort of blasé that can fully achieved by living in the depressing hellscape of 2025.
I think it also helped the documentary that while PRIDE was holding tournaments with 50,000 spectators in the Tokyo Dome with main event purses reaching hundreds of thousands of dollars per fight the world of Mixed Martial Arts fighting was strange and mysterious in the United States in 2002....so the doc was also a peek into a relatively unknown world.
This review had me at "Emily Blunt."
look she's a delight and has been for years; this is almost the definition of a thankless role, though