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'Million Dollar Baby': Clint's emotional clinch

By HAP ERSTEIN
Palm Beach Post

Boxing fans will get their money's worth from Clint Eastwood's visceral, emotional Million Dollar Baby, the story of a redneck woman determined to find her place in the world of the ring.

But the movie has other, deeper issues on its mind. With the knockout force of a surprise roundhouse punch, it turns away from Maggie Fitzgerald's gritty climb up the prizefight ladder, drawing in viewers with no interest in the so-called sport.

Warner Bros. Pictures 'Million Dollar Baby' A The verdict: A knockout for Eastwood and Swank in a boxing movie that becomes much more. Director: Clint Eastwood Starring: Clint Eastwood, Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman Run time: 132 minutes Release date: Jan. 7, 2005 Rating: PG-13 for violence, some disturbing images, thematic material and language See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer   -- Trailers require Quicktime Rate "Million Dollar Baby":   Go see it   Make it a matinee   Wait to rent   Don't bother Voter Limit: Once per Hour View Poll Results

It is hard to avoid the clichés of past boxing films and, early on, Million Dollar Baby, with a screenplay by television writer Paul Haggis based on short stories by F.X. Toole, does not seem to try.

It steeps itself in the sweat-stained milieu of a seedy Los Angeles boxing gym, owned and run by veteran trainer Frankie Dunn (Eastwood), who keeps dismissively turning down Maggie's (Hilary Swank) pleas that he take her on and teach her to fight.

Yes, of course, he will change his mind, and yes, this unlikely boxer will turn out to have a natural ability that floors Frankie — as well as most of her opponents. But we've seen all this before. Still, keep your guard up as Eastwood suckers you into relaxing your expectations, for his intentions go way beyond the genre, into matters of guilt, redemption and mortality.

There has not been a film ostensibly about boxing that is as rich in character detail as this one since 1980's Raging Bull.

Frankie is nothing if not complex, a reader of Yeats and student of Gaelic, a Catholic who attends Mass daily, apparently just to ask his priest irreverent theological questions. Estranged from his daughter, perhaps he sees a surrogate for her in Maggie, for his pride in her boxing prowess and the begrudging fatherly affection go beyond a professional relationship.

It is a role well-suited to Eastwood's laconic underplaying, but one with plenty to convey beneath the surface. Just as we had to adjust our opinions of him as a filmmaker after last year's Mystic River, Eastwood's underappreciated acting skill is due for a reassessment too.

Since her stunning Oscar-winning work in the intense Boys Don't Cry, Swank has faded into indifferent projects (The Affair of the Necklace, The Core), but again has an unglamorous role in which she can sink her teeth — mouth guard and all.

It is foremost a part with demands of extreme physicality, which she makes more than convincing. But just as we begin to write off Maggie as trailer trash, Swank shows us added dimensions to the character. She may be deemed too young to win her second Oscar now, but she will surely be in the running.

The third side of Million Dollar Baby's character-driven triangle is Morgan Freeman as former fighter Eddie "Scrap" Dupris, Frankie's second-in-command at the gym, his confidant and conscience and — significantly — the film's narrator. Like the character, Freeman quietly and unassumingly does his work and is crucial to the film's gravity.

Also worth noting is Margo Martindale as Maggie's selfish mother, who arrives whenever she senses she can take advantage of her daughter's hard-earned fortunes. The film's only misstep is with a supporting character, a hopeless but stubborn young palooka named "Danger" Barch (Jay Baruchel). The fault is not the actor's, but in a film grounded in such reality, the would-be fighter seems like such a literary symbol.

That is an insignificant quibble next to the achievement that is Million Dollar Baby. As the film's director, producer and star, it is a stunning triumph for Eastwood. Not bad for a guy who keeps getting better at 74. And in between his other chores, he penned the movie's musical score, as deceptively simple as everything else about the film.