**** – Lowell, Massachusetts: a formerly bustling and successful textile mill town that has fallen on hard times and become one of the easiest places in the world to score crack and/or get glassed by an angry Irishman for an imagined slight. The latter version is the setting for this 2010 biopic about the lives of boxer brothers Dicky Eklund and Mickey Ward. I have no real interest in boxing as a sport (I can’t get past all the punching) so I approached this one with trepidation despite its excellent reviews and a number of Oscar nominations. Luckily for me, there wasn’t really a whole lot of actual boxing in the movie, as it focused more on the completely opposing personalities of the two main characters and how their lives were intertwined with each other and with their overbearing family. I don’t know how accurate the story is but it certainly had an authentic feel to it. Like most movies based on fact, I am sure there is at least a fair amount of truth mixed in with some exaggeration and a few complete fabrications. If I had to guess what wasn’t true, it would have to be the almost angelic nature of Mark Wahlberg’s take on Ward, and the nearly demonic nature of his mother and seven sisters. Be that as it may, all the actors did tremendous jobs in whatever role they had, from the evil sisters to the browbeaten father and especially Christian Bale as Eklund. I highly recommend this even to those who aren’t fond of boxing.
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