Boxing dramas often feature a sequence where the boxer must undergo relentless cardio and a crash diet to make weight for their weigh-in.
Boxers have to come in below the weight limit of their class to ensure a fair fight. This weight is artificially low, as water, glycogen, and fat are systematically stripped away to temporarily reduce body mass. After the weigh-in, the athlete has a window of time to rehydrate and "carb up," often regaining as much as 20 pounds before the actual fight.
Recently, films like Foxcatcher have included a sequence dramatizing this intense process. If you stretch such a sequence to feature length, you get Sean Ellis' The Cut, starring Orlando Bloom in what could be one of his defining roles.
The Cut is appreciably simple in scope and modest in execution. Bloom plays an ex-boxing champion, past his prime, credited only as "Boxer" in the credits. Out of the blue, organizer Donny (Gary Beadle) offers him the chance to step in for a social media influencer who's dropped out of a high-profile fight in Las Vegas against another YouTuber, Lupe (Mohammed Mansaray). These influencer fights are a real hustle that many social media personalities have dabbled in. Regardless of the outcome, participation alone guarantees a huge pot of money, more followers, more views and hence even more money. Motivated by the money and the personal challenge, Boxer agrees to fill in.
The catch? It is a light middleweight fight, meaning the Boxer must be 154 lbs at the weigh-in. He's currently 186 and must cut 32 lbs in six days. While not beyond the realm of reason or possibility, it is still a steep hill to climb and bound to be a traumatizing experience, physically, mentally and emotionally. And this is just to ensure his participation; he'll still have to fight after this brutal ordeal.
It is a comprehensible conflict that the viewers can follow and has ticking clock suspense as each day progresses and the weight gets lower. The film is admirably contained, taking place in a few rooms with a small cast.
Besides Bloom, the other characters helping Boxer are his partner Caitlin (Caitríona Balfe), Manny (Ed Kear) and Paolo (Andonis Anthony). The trump card is Boz (John Turturro), actually Lupe's trainer but recruited by Donny to help Boxer when it becomes apparent with two days to go that Boxer won't make weight. No one makes money if the fight doesn't happen, not Donny, Lupe or even Boz.
The Cut convincingly immerses viewers into the extremity of cutting 32 pounds; by itself, it is not an insurmountable task, but the compressed time frame of six days makes it almost biologically impossible. Bloom's Boxer gradually comes apart at the seams as his carbs and calories are cut to dangerous lows, his mind hallucinates, and his body starts to shut down.
Yet he must spend almost every waking minute doing cardio on the treadmill or the stationary bike, wrapped in layers of clothing to induce sweat and practically sleep in the sauna. The extreme shocks to his system put him at risk of overheating, immune system failure, and cardiac arrest.
Viewers will watch with mounting dread as Turro's hard taskmaster resorts to ever more boundary-pushing measures, like diuretics, drugs, and even drawing blood to shed every last milligram. In the final stages, Boxer is asked to jerk off as even a few droplets of ejaculate might move the scale down. These portions are rife with shouting matches between Balfe and Turturro as Boxer seems headed to a prolonged stint in the hospital and coma if not death.
The dramatic weight-cutting would likely be engaging on its own. Still, writers Justin Bull and Mark Lane clearly thought otherwise as they braid another storyline line throughout - black-and-white trauma-dump flashbacks to Boxer's childhood. These sequences recount the brutal assault and murder of his young mother. The Cut thus positions Boxer's physical and psychological ordeal as a reckoning with a buried past in order to escalate the drama and threaten Boxer's sanity even further. The secondary narrative seems designed to lift the film above a mere sports drama and provide a greater actorly opportunity to Bloom.
Bloom does fine work in a rare, juicy leading part. Since his breakout in The Lord Of The Rings franchise, Bloom has had a fitful career as a leading man, relegated to pretty boy roles, supporting character work and honestly, not much opportunity to demonstrate his acting skills meaningfully. The Cut addresses that and Bloom commits. The Cut is also a documentary about Bloom's body. Bloom actually accomplished an identical 35-pound cut in real life, though over several months and not six days. He did experience several negative side effects, and those are channeled into his performance and faithfully captured on-screen.
The part calls for a lack of vanity, and Bloom is unsparing - to a degree. His face is sunken due to all the lost weight, and the dark circles amplify the hollows of his eye sockets. A scraggly beard, bad haircut and terrible teeth complete the picture. Frankly, though, any part that calls for repeated close-ups of your absolutely shredded torso can't really be deemed to be unflattering.
Also, in a film where the actor's body is literally the prime narrative focus, there is a coyness in how Bloom's body is photographed. Seeing the musculature come to the fore as fat is cut would be of narrative and anatomical interest to viewers. Yet Bloom's legs are almost always out of the frame - perhaps an attempt to hide underdeveloped leg muscles - giving credence to the adage that Hollywood stars don't train legs. On balance, Bloom does enough to anchor the film, stretches himself as an actor and deserves commendation for taking on such a physically challenging part at the age of 47.
Thankfully, the writers don't relegate Balfe to just being a supporting girlfriend; instead, they make her Boxer's coach and business partner. She dons an authentic Irish accent in a well-crafted performance. Turturro, as the antagonistic figure, is appropriately ruthless. Kear, Beadle and Mansaray also make an impression.
The film is distinguished by its ending. The severity of cutting weight needed a memorable hook, and The Cut goes there in a shocking finale that serves as a stinging, pungent punchline.
Overall, the film delivers what it promised on the tin and should find an appreciable audience of not just athletes and gym junkies but anyone that's ever tried to watch their weight and tried to get in shape.