Cinderella Man

Director: Ron Howard
Main Cast: Russell Crowe, Renee Zellweger, Paul Giamatti
Writer(s): Cliff Hollingsworth & Akiva Goldsman
Director of Photography: Salvatore Totino
Producer: Brian Grazer, Ron Howard, Penny Marshall
Editor(s): Mike Hill & Daniel P. Hanley
Original Score By: Thomas Newman
Release Date: 2005 May 23

There is one thing undeniable about Ron Howard and his goofy grin and thinning red hair: he knows how to tell a story. From Apollo 13, to A Beautiful Mind, to Cinderella Man his skills are exemplary. He is one of those people, we have all met them, that just know how to tell a great story. It keeps your attention. It moves your emotions. You almost cannot help but get involved and care for those characters and topics being discussed. I believe Ron Howard has this gift. His stories are not those told around the campfire, but rather they are communicated in theaters across the globe. Nevertheless, the ability to take a simple situation and make of it a story is not often realized in the fashion and grandeur which Howard successfully achieves. Don't be surprised to see the man on stage next March accepting a statue or two.

When you boil this film down to its bone you will find that it is less about a boxer and his rise and fall and more about hope. Hope for something better. Hope for second chances. Hope for those who have none. In fact the tag line says it well, "When America was on its knees, he brought us to our feet." Braddock's life was a pillar of hope for all those that knew him and even those who had merely heard of him and his story. His legacy is powerful enough to move us almost 75 years later.

Despite troubles off the set, Crowe manages to create an unforgettable character and masters the art of the fallen man given a second chance. Isn't this really what we all are? Here on the Earth fallen from grace given a second change at Life? Crowe plays the boxer,Braddock, magnificently.

Braddock is a man of his word. His 'yes' is a 'yes' and his 'no' a 'no'. I kept waiting for him to recant on his promise to never send his kids away and fall into a not atypical Hollywood trap, but he remained steadfast. His word meant so much to him that he was willing to humble himself in extraordinary ways to maintain its significance. Begging from friends at the boxing venue and standing in line at the federal assistance office you could visibly see the pain that it caused him to do so. He sacrificed his reputation to hold his family together. What a deep and meaningful expression of his loyalty to his family and to his own honor. His character continued in this vein when he made his comeback and repaid the money to the financial assistance office that he had used during the period when he had none. This moment was truly a testament to the character.

His desparation ran so deep that he even commented, "I'm all prayed out, Mae". He had become so down that he had given up on God. He had lost his faith. He knew that he could no longer control the things around him and adequately provide for his responsiblities. He was at the bottom of the barrel. The interesting thing about it is that God had not given up on him. The moment when Zellweger goes to the church to pray for his big fight and finds out that the pews are filled with believers praying for her husband is inspiring. Prayers that night were heard and answered.

The relationship of Mr. and Mrs. Braddock was near flawlessly developed. I cannot remember one time where one told the other, "I love you". Yet, there wasn't a single point in the movie where their dedication, encouragement, and undying affection for one another wasn't clearly communicated. The teasing about the girls at the fight, the working hard even with a broken hand, the looks, the long embraces, there was no denying the two were crazy about each other. Their's was an unforgettable testament to the sanctity and perserverance of a marriage during times of significant difficulty.

This film brought the Great Depression alive off the screen. I likened it to reading a great Steinbeck novel. The excruciating detail of the poverty was brutally apparent and the pain and suffering of regular everyday families was heart wrenching. The destititution that most lived through was in many ways unbearable to watch. How the lack of work and money broke apart families. Husbands leaving their wives, parents sending their kids away. It brought home the reality of the era in which the story took place. A critical mind may also wonder how far each of us is away from living like many of the families portrayed in this film. One paycheck? Two? It is an undeniably sobering realization.

Despite the ubiquitous poverty, there were many who continued to keep up appearances. I found the moment when Zellweger entered Giamatti's (Bradock's manager) apartment to find only a card table and four chairs in an empty room to be particularly poignant to this point. No one wants to admit that they are down and out, but the stronger of the men, Braddock, is willing to confess his situation and do whatever it took to make ends meet, even sacrifice his self respect.

There were few items in the film that I found troublesome or annoying, but I will mention the ones I noticed. I was so taken by the story that I'm sure my enjoyment clouded my vision for defects. However, isn't that a sign of a successful film?

I have never been very impressed with Renee Zellweger. Since Jerry Macguire I have often grown weary of her sideways smile and squinty eyes. I find her performances flat and and her lines too whiny. That being said her agent has been victoriously getting her parts in terrific movies. I'm still not convinced she deserved the Oscar she got, but then again, I don't get to vote. All that aside, I do not feel she is a bad actress, but merely average. She is able to communicate the emotional intensity of the character, but for some reaon, and I cannot quite pinpoint it, she does not stir me as other actresses are able to.

There were a couple of other negative issues with Cinderella Man that stood out to me. The first was the inconsistent accents. At one point Jim has a untarnished American accent and then a few scenes later he sounds like a native Bostonian. Supporting characters speak with no accent and then suddenly are Irish. I think uniformity one way or the other would have been preferable. Just pick one and stick with it.

Also, the score of a film should be their for one reason: to enhance the experience. It should be used to evoke more emotion, be it terror to sentimentality. It should blend with the dialogue, visuals, and sound effects to give the viewer a better feel for what is occuring on the screen. We are not listening to a symphony performance, but watching a film, an art form that intermingles together many others. Unfortunately, I did not experience this with Newman's overly emphasized score. In many cases I felt it did not blend well with the scene and often detracted from the overall tone of the story.

Finally, the coloring in the film was bad in several scenes. Howard apparently used an aging technique, whether digital or traditional, to give the film a Saving Private Ryan look and the feel of the depression era films. This was a well planned concept, but the execution was poor. Cut to cut, even in the same scene, the film had highly varied graininess and coloring, sometimes so much so that I couldn't focus on the dialogue. Variation with the film tone could be in part due to the fact that I viewed the movie a couple of weeks following initial release after it had been shown multiple times previously. Because of the somewhat fragile nature of the film stock it is possible that the print was becoming worn and that is what I witnessed. Nevertheless, I felt it worthwhile to mention. This is just another point in the argument of moving to fully digital filmmaking.

Bottom Line: Harkening back to the Steinbeck era, Ron Howard creates an epic story of Hope during an era of Desparation. Most of the performances on screen are commendable, save some issues I had with Zellweger. Offscreen disciplines, editing, directing, photography, were all subtle and understated, but served the picture well. The score was overbearing and intrusive, but it hardly was enough to fully undermine the powerful and wonderful story assembled by the brilliant team of filmmakers.

An uppercut, 8 out of 10.

~RG