Million Dollar Baby (2004)
reviewed by Benn "Where's the Humanity?" Farrell & Brian "The Naked Gun" Felts
"Million Dollar Baby" is about Frank, a life long boxing trainer who runs a gym where he
aids the new fists of the sport make a name for themselves, only to leave him for more
another manager promising more money and exposure. At his side is longtime friend
Eddie "Scrap Iron" Dupris, a former fighter who was forced to give up his time in
the ring after losing sight in one eye.
Soon, Frank is approached by a woman named Maggie, age 31, who carries a huge desire
and work ethic for boxing, but very little tools. At first, Frank gives her the
cold shoulder, but eventually, after getting help from Dupris, and after Frank is
stiffed by his latest championship contender, Maggie gets Frank to help her.
As Maggie education continues, we learn Frank has issues with a daughter who
won't forgive him for something. We never get to find out why. That sucks. So,
now he has this big emptiness in his life where his daughter should be. Maggie
begins to fill this void. Maggie's father, whom she loved very much and loved
her back, has passed away some time ago, and now Frank gets to play this role
in her life. The relationship development between the two characters is great.
The entire picture is voiced over by Dupris, who we later find out is writing Frank's
story in a letter to Frank's daughter, hoping she would finally know the kind of
man his friend became.
Warning: do not read on unless you want the third act twist spoiled for you.
However, as Maggie finally reaches a title shot in Las Vegas, NM, where she gets
sucker punched by a dirty fighting champion and lands poorly on a stool, cracks
her neck, busts up her spinal cord and becomes a quadrapalegic.
Eventually, she asks Frank to end her life, since she got to live her dream a
while and does not want to live the rest of her life motionless in a bed, getting
limbs amputated now and then from infection. Frank reels about it and screenwriter
Paul Haggis (Crash, Red Hot) uses the situation to make statements about the pros
and cons of euthanasia. Eventually, Frank does the deed and runs away, leaving
Dupris to take over the gym.
I really enjoy little neuances about the film. For instance, the character of
mentally challenged wannabe boxer Danger Barch coming back after a solid a**
woopin' to keep working on his fighting skills. This gave contrast to the situation
of Maggie wanting to give up, as well as Frank emotionally at one point in the picture.
Scenes between Clint Eastwood (Blood Work) as Frank and Morgan Freeman as
Dupris were the best scenes of the picture. Freeman picked up an Academy Award®
for his time in this movie, well deserved.
Eastwood and Academy Award® winner Hillary Swank (Boys Don't Cry) also had a
great chemistry. Swank nabbed her second statuette with her performance, also well deserved.
I also must say, I have never thought of Eastwood as an actor, as greatly as
I've thought of him as a director in the last ten years. However, I think the
75 year old actor/filmmaker may look back at this performance as the peak of his
later acting career. "Million Dollar Baby" may serve as the twilight of the man's
acting career, and he hit it hard. This was one of the best role's I've seen
him do, if not THE best. Eastwood also picked up his second Academy Award® this year for
directing the picture.
Even though I enjoyed the picture for its relationships between characters, once
the picture became about Maggie paralyzed, it dragged on. The last 50 minutes of
the picture were the longest to sit through.
When the picture's time was devoted to the euthanasia part of the third act,
the picture became almost boring. I had a tough time figuring out how this
situation fit into the messages we were given through Frank and Maggie's
friendship as well as Frank and Dupris' friendship. I think if Eastwood and
Haggis wanted to end their movie as a tragedy, there could have been a less heavy
and life ending way to do it. I honestly think this direction the picture took
bought the overall story down one level away from a perfect movie.
Other than this, I felt the picture was well deserving of its Best Picture win. It
simply adds itself to an already long list of great movies to be released in 2004. It
has its faults, but its characters and performances are so strong, I feel it's
nothing less than a solid piece of entertainment.
Benn - Where's the Humanity?
Man, I am sick and tired of watching a grizzled old character, played by Clint Eastwood, help a
young know it all who is in dire need of a lesson. This pains me to say too because I enjoy many
of Eastwood's movies. I enjoyed this movie, in some parts, and down right loathed other parts. As
far as best picture goes, there are other movies I wish would have received the award instead of this
one. Its ok, but it isn't all that.
I did enjoy the interaction between Clint Eastwood's character Frankie, and Morgan Freeman's character,
Eddie. I think these two delivered to masterful performances and personify greatness in acting. The timing
was perfect and they had full knowledge of who they were portraying. Every time they were on screen together
or by themselves the movie was very enjoyable. I will say, however, again, that I am tired of seeing Clint in
this role. He has mastered it and I don't know if it can get any better, and I don't know what else he can do.
This movie does show that the 70+ year old actor can no longer do action movies because whenever Clint had to
have any kind of physical action, his body just couldn't respond to what his mind wanted him to do. Morgan
Freeman once again proved why he is one of the finest actors in the last 15 years. Freeman is so good at
acting without saying a word. His facial features can give more information than any line in a script
sometimes. These two actors made this movie.
What I did not like was not so much Hillary Swank, but the way her character was written. I thought
she did a fine job in the part that was written for her but I don't really care about the character. I
know I will get hate mail, but I don't really care about the trials and tribulations of the female boxer.
I think that the whole reason why her character was written as a female was so that we can feel even more
pain at the end of the movie because it's always harder to see a women die than a man, especially in those
circumstances. Then you add to this character a family that is so stereo-typical white trash that doesn't
care about her until they can get rich of her, again makes us feel more compassion for a women then it would
for a man. The part was written to use the gender of the character to artificially add drama to the movie.
Which is why I do not agree with Swank getting the best actress award, because the part was written for any
competent female actress could have achieved just as much as she did. Maybe even Angelina Jole and she hasn't
actually had to "act" in ten years.
Another problem I have with the movie is the story of how Swank's character Maggie, gets injured. If
Mike Tyson can get suspended from boxing for biting off someone's ear, twice, then the female boxer, the
blue bear, would have been suspended after the second elbow she threw in her second fight before she ever
would have had a shot at the title. No boxing commission is going to allow the kind of crap that she was
doing constantly, and female boxing doesn't have a big enough cult following to allow popularity to over
ride the boxer's bulls**t fighting stile. I am interested in knowing whether or not the decision to
make Maggie's character female came from the writer of the story the movie was based on, F. X. Toole,
a pseudo name for a man that spent 40 years in the boxing sport, or the screenwriter Paul Haggis. I
have a hard time imagining a 70-year old Irishman who has been in the sport for 40 years write about
a female boxer. But I could be wrong.
In my opinion, "The Aviator", "Hotel Rwanda", and "The Incredibles" were better movies than this one. I
have yet to see "Ray" so I do not know how it is compared to "Million Dollar Baby." I love Morgan Freeman
and Clint Eastwood, I dislike the story. I think there is better out there. Brian - the Naked Gun
This 2005 Academy Award® winner for Best Picture started out as a story about an elderly
trainer and a not-so-young female fighter who fill emptiness in each others' lives through boxing.
However, the film ended as an awkward tale about the pros and cons of uthanasia.