Tuesday 30 August 2011

"Fight Night" (2008) AKA "Rigged"


Being low budget certainly is no excuse for poor writing. Usually it's the excuse for the writing being above par. However in Fight Night, the writing is its biggest weakness. 
                The movie was first titled "Rigged" as in rigged fights. However this film is not really about rigging fights but the opposite, so this title change is actually a good chose.  Story is about a failed, and continuingly failing con artist who meets  a thin and attractive female fighter who's capable of knocking large men in seconds. He then joins forces with her and pulls what he calls a "reverse rigged" fights that appear to be rigged but are not. This was my first problem with the story line. If he is known for rigging fights, why are people still taking bets from him. Especially those that he's lost to because of fighters admitting to rigging fights. How is making an authentic fight appear rigged but actually now be any benefit to getting deals? That doesn’t make sense to me.
                The two then begin a road trip from fight to fight, allowing the downtimes to develop the characters. Another point that doesn't make sense to me, is that our con artist is quoted by some to be, "The best fight promoter in the industry". If this is true, then why do we see him do nothing but fail, owe money to others, and have death threats and people trying to kill him? Doesn't seem to be the best in the industry to me.
                We never really get to know the fighter too well, besides a small little tale about how when she let her parents know about a lesbian experience being thrown out of the house and her wanting to come back with a bag filled of money. Her story didn't really make any sense to me. And the script teeters back and forth to whether she is gay or not. In the end what it amounts to is a writer who is not thinking about what would be realistic as much as what he believes a boxing/fighting story needs to have according to every other Rocky wannabe. Ashame really, being that this has potential to be a great low budget sleeper.

Avoid It.

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