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The movie boasts a impressive ensemble, telling the true story of Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle, who guided a cheeky Yorkshire teenager from Middle Eastern migrant family. Known as Naseem Hamed, the youngster was taught to confront racist bullies and molded into a celebrity titleholder in the late 90s. Ingle cultivated his showboating arrogance and lethal fists, but after achieving wealth, the boxer betrayed his coach, excluding him and turning him into a blend of John Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Cast and Characters

Pierce Brosnan portrays Ingle; Amir El-Masry embodies the part of the prince, and Stephens appears as the bullish promoter Warren, who saw the potential that Ingle had discovered.

Where the Movie Falls Short

However, the movie honestly lacks the Prince’s fancy footwork: the boxing sequences run smoothly, but the crucial story in between is consistently flat and one-note. There is no nuance or light and shade in the portrayal of the protagonist himself, and El-Masry, an otherwise outstanding performer, doesn’t get the chance to display any depth or much of what might make his role truly engaging – although he’s obviously been working out and appears convincing in the ring.

Problems with Script and Sound

The story is often burdened by functional, expositional dialogue that inform you exactly what is happening and what we are supposed to be thinking (“You started your career at age seven …”). It is the sort of script that digital producers call “double-screen”, making sure you know what’s going on while you’re watching the film but also glancing at your device. And, the background music is overpowering, sometimes nearly overwhelming, especially in the moment where Hamed gets overexcited calling on the promoter in his palatial residence.

Performances and Key Moments

While the leads do their very utmost, their dynamic doesn’t quite ignites, and the major boxing moments are often anticlimactically truncated. The most important moment is certainly when, goaded past his limit in the training facility one day by the boxer as a delusional “old man”, Ingle in fact offers to step into the ring and box him. All present in the room is shocked and uncomfortable. In what way is this insanely unwise standoff going to play out? How precisely the outcome? Certainly the Prince is going to defeat him? Or will he sentimentally hold back? The resolution remains ambiguous.

Highlights and Humor

That’s not to say that there are no some nice jabs. Brosnan elicits humor when Ingle tells a journalist what he’s instructing the youths from his neighborhood: to reject prejudice and when you meet a paedophile, “Punch him in the bollocks”. It’s funny too when Hamed squirms at the silly stunts the coach makes him do in the beginning: acting like the “beast from the Middle East”.

Plot and Conclusion

As for the falling out, the film shows this as being exacerbated by a tell-all publication that Ingle is allegedly authored (a story element clearly adapted from prior material), and there is an intriguingly imagined last discussion – however the emotional tribute that Hamed is reportedly paid to his mentor after his passing is only referenced in the end titles, and not dramatised on film. There is interesting material in this film, but the punches fail to connect.

Giant screened at the festival and is available in British and Irish theaters from January 9.