Whether or not Sydney Sweeney has great jeans has been debated at length over the summer. What is not up for debate is that Sweeney is one of our brightest and most watchable young stars today.
Her deglamorized role in a sports biopic as a lesbian boxer is no doubt a reach for legitimacy. Yet, it showcases her ability to carry a film not with her appearance but with her performance. She may or may not win awards, which Christy is clearly designed for. But it should rest any discourse about Sweeney being a committed, curious, or ambitious actor. One doesn't just do such roles for the plaudits alone; one must also love the game.
Sweeney stars as Christy Martin, who is, by some estimations, the most notable female boxer in the United States. Although female boxing is still not particularly popular or lucrative today, it was definitely not the case when Martin started her career at 18. She finished in 2012 at age 41, and Christy, the standard off-the-shelf biopic it is, dutifully gives us the entire trajectory in its lengthy 135-minute runtime.
We begin in 1989, when Christy, a high-school basketball player, participates in local 'Toughwoman' boxing events for kicks and aces them. She is secretly, or not-so-secretly, in a relationship with Rosie (Jess Gabor), and her conservative West Virginia family disapproves. She gets noticed at the Toughwoman contests and is offered a small stipend, accommodation and training with a coach, Jim Martin (Ben Foster). Soon they are having success, travelling around and winning matches as a team.
This early portion is the best stretch of Christy—a quintessential sports movie, hard-knuckled and scrappy, focusing on the loneliness of an athlete's life. Sweeney is sweet and self-effacing and easy to root for. She also physically commits to the part, sporting a butch, heavy-set, stocky physique, a far cry from her highly cultivated, million-dollar movie star looks.
The halting romance between her and Jim, balding and beer-bellied and 25 years her senior, proceeds agreeably enough until he manipulates her into marrying him, and she reluctantly agrees. From then on, the Wikipedia survey begins as we zoom through the years, more matches and victories, more contracts and interviews. Chad L. Coleman, as promoter extraordinare, Don King makes a significant impression. What also surfaces are the money problems, the jealousy, the drug addiction and the horrifying domestic violence.
Christy has lost all steam by now and seems to be meandering until it arrives at a shocking event, which we suspect is why the film was made in the first place. Martin is a notable figure, but if you are unfamiliar with her life story, this incident will be a stunning surprise, as it was for yours truly. Audiences might do well to not read up on her life before watching Christy, as it might lessen the impact. It is a small miracle writers Mirrah Foulkes and David Michôd did not see fit to begin with this incident and flash back to the rest of her life. It would immediately put audiences in Christy's corner.
Be that as it may, Sweeney is appealing enough and performs the role with humility. She is supported by a strong cast led by Foster. Foster has morphed into one of our most valuable character actors, disappearing into roles and bringing forth raw humanity, warts and all, even in a despicable character like Jim Martin.
Katy O'Brian is one of Christy's boxing opponents who evolves into a frenemy and then something more. Bryan Hibbard and Tony Cavalero make an impression as her manager and sparring partner.
Ethan Embry and Merritt Wever are excellent as her parents. However, the unsympathetic family of a female boxer trope might remind viewers of Million Dollar Baby, a film funnily referenced in Christy, as the movie came out in 2004, when Christy was yet an active boxer. At one point, Foster says Hillary Swank might play Christy in a film. It is fair to say that, though Christy tries to emulate the gritty Best Picture winner, it never comes close to the devastating power of Clint Eastwood's masterpiece.
Christy is competently directed by Michôd, and the film does have zip in the first act until it gets bogged down by "this, then this" biopic drudgery. Surely, these decade-spanning formulaic biopics are quite passé these days? Innovation for the sake of it is also unwelcome, but Michôd attempts absolutely nothing off the beaten path and plays it straight down the middle. The boxing scenes are plentiful and staged well, but do not really stand out from each other and are same-y, save for differing opponents.
The tedium in the latter part of Christy is only undone by the aforementioned shocking event, which brings the film back to life just as it is about to conclude. Christy Martin's story is worth telling, and Michôd's film is perhaps the best we will get.
Watch it then for Sweeney, who, like her megastar female predecessors Jennifer Lawrence, Scarlett Johansson, and Emma Stone, is beginning to branch into more interesting roles. If only the young male starlets of Hollywood had a similar desire to challenge themselves.