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This film boasts a talented ensemble, telling the true tale of coach Ingle, who mentored a brash Sheffield teenager from Yemeni immigrant family. Known as “Prince” Naseem Hamed, the youngster was coached to stand up to prejudice and transformed into a celebrity titleholder in the late 90s. Ingle cultivated his showboating confidence and powerful punches, but after achieving wealth, the boxer turned against his mentor, excluding him and making him a mix of John Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Cast and Characters

Pierce Brosnan plays Ingle; Amir El-Masry embodies the role of Hamed, and Stephens appears as the assertive London promoter Warren, who saw the potential that Ingle had uncovered.

Film’s Shortcomings

However, the film honestly lacks the fighter’s fancy footwork: the boxing sequences run smoothly, but the all-important story between them is consistently dull and monotonous. It lacks nuance or contrast in the portrayal of the protagonist himself, and El-Masry, an otherwise excellent talent, isn’t given the chance to display any subtlety or much of what might make his role really interesting – even though he’s obviously been training and looks very plausible in the ring.

Dialogue and Music Issues

The drama is often burdened by functional, explanatory dialogue that tell you precisely what is going on and what we are meant to feel (“Your journey began your boxing journey at seven years old …”). This is the sort of script that streaming-TV executives call “double-screen”, making sure you know what’s going on while you’re viewing the film but also checking your device. Additionally, the background music is overpowering, sometimes nearly deafening, particularly in the moment where the boxer gets too excited calling on the promoter in his palatial residence.

Acting and Pivotal Scenes

While El-Masry and Brosnan do their very utmost, their dynamic never really comes to life, and the major fight scenes are often anticlimactically truncated. The most important scene is surely when, provoked past his limit in the gym one day by Hamed as a misguided “old man”, Ingle actually offers to get in the ring and fight him. Everyone in the room is shocked and uncomfortable. How exactly is this extremely unwise confrontation going to play out? How precisely the ending? Certainly the champion is going to defeat him? Alternatively will he emotionally hold back? It’s not clear.

Highlights and Humor

This isn’t to imply that there are no some good moments. Brosnan gets laughs when his character tells a reporter what he’s instructing the kids from his neighborhood: to oppose bias and when you encounter a paedophile, “Hit them in the bollocks”. It’s funny too when the boxer fidgets at the ridiculous stunts Ingle makes him do in the early days: acting like the “beast from the East”.

Plot and Conclusion

Regarding the rift, the film shows this as being worsened by a revealing book that the trainer is supposed to have authored (a story element evidently adapted from prior material), and there is an interestingly imagined final conversation – however the heartfelt homage that the boxer is supposed to have paid to his mentor after his death is only mentioned in the end titles, and not shown on film. Some engaging content here, but the blows don’t land.

Giant was shown at the London film festival and is available in British and Irish theaters from January 9.