I’ve seen a lot of boxing films in my day. This is one of the sports that makes for very engaging and interesting stories. Especially when they’re based on a real-life person like Christy is. There have been a few female boxing films in the past, The Fire Inside, Girlfight, and the most famous of them all Million Dollar Baby in which Hilary Swank won her second academy awards for best actress. Sydney Sweeney has an uphill battle following that performance from twenty or so years ago. That was a fictional film, dealing with realistic things from the time, and this one isn’t. It’s based on a real woman who went through everything depicted in this true life sports biopic.

Christy Martin (Sydney Sweeney) is a normal girl who plays basketball in school and dates a girl she quite likes in rural West Virginia. On a whim, she enters a tough man contest for girls and wins. This gets noticed by a low-level fight promoter who takes her under his wing. He gets her a couple of fights in Tennessee.Then he introduces her to a trainer named Jim Martin (Ben Foster), who is a bit of a jerk towards her. He doesn’t want to train her at first, but once he sees what she can do, he decides to train her. Once he starts to work with her, he notices she has what it takes to be a great fighter. This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship, as they say. Until it isn’t, which is a tragic ending to a good working and romantic partnership.

I’m a big fan of Sydney Sweeney as an actress, but I’m pretty upset by how the country wants to cancel her over the American Eagle Outfitters campaign regarding having good jeans. It’s terrible how we as a country take something as simple as a jeans campaign and turn it into a racial thing. She is a very talented actress, and I’ve loved her in Euphoria, Americana, Emmaculate, and now Christy. She has gotten better and better with each performance she’s given in her career, but she gives the best of her career as this fiery boxer turned abuse victim.  Combined with the makeup and hairstyling teams, she morphs into this woman.  She deserves an Academy Award nomination for her performance as this woman who went through a lot in her lifetime but never gave up.

Another actor in the cast I want to mention is Ben Foster. Who is absolutely unrecognizable as Jerry Martin, the trainer and abusive husband of the Sweeney character. Once again, the makeup and hairstyling team do lamins work here as they give Foster a hairpiece and make him look nothing like himself. As fans of his have seen in films like Survivor,  he can morph into anybody he wants to in his career. He has the southern Tennessee accent down pat and even adds a goofy walk to the character to make him his own. Even the Nike shirts and outfits he wears add to the character. He absolutely became this terrible human being. I wanted to jump through the screen. I hated him so much.That’s because of the great acting by Foster and the phenomenal makeup and hairstyling team.

As a fan of boxing movies, I’m very critical of the boxing scenes in these sports films. With this being a female boxer and boxing matches, I can give it a little bit more leeway. With this being a true story and the woman who is featured in the picture was probably on set and giving the actors pointers on the boxing, it should be depicted pretty well. There were a number of fight scenes that I thought were good, but they seemed to be accented with sound effects to supplement the boxing. This probably was to give something for the viewers to focus on instead of the less than exceptional boxing sequences. I’ve seen worse boxing scenes in other films of this nature, but it’s hard for me to get totally on board for these fights. That being said, I know their based on real fights, so I can give them a bit of a pass. They didn’t bother me that much, though.

I’m always amazed by the way filmmakers are able to capture the places they are trying to depict on screen from the stories they are telling. I loved all the different locations from a Bristol Motorspeedway to various hotels in Daytona Beach and Las Vegas to a house in Apopka, Florida. As well as the various gyms with all the memorabilia on the ways. The ESPN set and various other locations were all captured exceptionally well. I felt like I was in the places where the film took place with the actors. As well as the costumes and hairstyling on some of the other actors I haven’t mentioned, like Merritt Wever, Katy O’Brian, and Chad Coleman. They also both looked great as their characters. 

I was vaguely familiar with Christy Marty before the violent near death physical abuse happened in 2010. When I saw this on the news back then, I lived in Central Florida for 33 years, I was genuinely shocked by it. It was quite disturbing for me to see what happened to this woman.  I have been exposed to domestic abuse in a way. My mother was beaten by my father when I was a kid. I saw this going on and got involved and got beaten myself. Seeing the abuse firsthand in this film was very hard for me to watch. I felt so bad for what this woman,  even though she was a boxer, was going through. People say “oh she’s a boxer.” How could she not defend herself? I say there is still a difference in the strength and anger of a man compared to a woman in this kind of situation. There is a big difference i the  physicality of these genders. I hope this film sheds light on domestic abuse in this country. It’s a perfect example of what women all over the country are going through on a given day, month, or year.

Christy is another good boxing biopic among others I’ve seen over the years. None have come close to Raging Bull for me, but in a way, these two movies are connected because of the abuse some characters receive at the hands of others. The boxing scenes are good, and they look realistic for the time and that they take place in. The production design, costumes, make-up, and hairstyling are all very good and brought me into this story completely. The acting by both Sweeney and Foster is the real reason to see this film. They both give awards worthy performances as this female boxer and her husband/ trainer. They are very indicative of a lot of couples in this country. That’s why I always say, “Get to know the person you’re going to marry as much as you can before you tie the knot. Live with the other person a while first. You find out a lot about a person when you live with them before you marry someone.This movie is very well made by David Michod in all aspects that I measure films by. I hope people go see this movie and give it the spotlight it needs this awards season. It deserves all the coverage.

4 ½ stars

Dan Skip Allen