‘Southpaw’: Newfangled boxing movie borrows from the old ones

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Even with the searing, ear-splitting hip-hop soundtrack featuring Eminem and Bad Meets Evil and Action Bronson & Joey Bada$$, even with the edgy camerawork and the 21st century setting, “Southpaw” comes across as a movie concoction you’d get if you put a bunch of old boxing films in a cinematic blender.

Famously chiseled for the role to the point where he’s more ripped than 90 percent of actual professional fighters, Jake Gyllenhaal plays Billy Hope (that name!), a light-heavyweight boxer fighting battles in and out of the ring, as they say. Antoine Fuqua’s blood-spitting, melodramatic and shamelessly sentimental drama contains elements from a number of famous boxing movies, to wit:

• Former champion deals with serious personal issues while never wavering in his love for his adorably precocious offspring. (See “The Champ,” 1931 and 1979 editions.)

• Crusty trainer agrees to take on sweatshirt-wearing, big-hearted, slightly punch-drunk fighter — but only if they play by the trainer’s rules. (“Rocky,” 1976.)

• Hardheaded fighter delights in taunting opponents, even as they bloody his face, and seems to actually enjoy taking punishment in the ring. (“Raging Bull,” 1980.)

• Evil villain contender crudely comes on to the champ’s wife in a public setting. (“Rocky III,” 1982.)

• Right-handed fighter switches to southpaw in an effort to confound his opponent. (“Rocky II,” 1979.)

I could keep going and we’d probably touch on ALL the “Rockys” before it was all over. Suffice to say while “Southpaw” will surprise almost no one who has seen a fair amount of boxing movies, Fuqua’s direction and the excellent performances keep the action humming, and despite myself I almost rose up out of my chair a few times during the climactic battle, because I wanted our man Billy Hope to just DESTROY that very, very, very bad man in the ring with him.

When we meet Billy, he’s the undisputed light-heavyweight champion of the world, defending his title against a younger opponent in a bout that turns out to be much tougher than the experts predicted. Billy’s now 43-0, but he’s in his mid-30s, bruised and battered, and showing signs of wear and tear. (He’s surprised to learn his daughter has a cell phone. His wife reminds him it was Billy’s idea to get her the phone — two months ago.)

Billy grew up in Hell’s Kitchen and was raised by the system. When he was 12, he met a spunky girl named Maureen, and that spunky girl grew up to be Rachel McAdams. More than two decades later, they have a loving marriage, a terrific daughter named Leila (Oona Laurence in a winning performance) and one of those giant, echo-laden mansions favored by many professional athletes. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, if you’ve seen the ads or the trailer for “Southpaw,” you already know what goes wrong. Far be it from me to criticize the famously successful marketing team at Weinstein for giving away far too much in the trailer and advertisements for “Southpaw” — wait, actually I WILL criticize them for giving away a hugely important and tragic development that happens fairly early in the film.

Even if you know what’s coming, that scene is powerful and devastating. Now the real story begins.

Gyllenhaal goes deep with his performance, with a touch of Brando-esque mumbling in his line deliveries, and some bursts of rage that would make Sean Penn blush. Occasionally it feels like grandstanding — acting for the sake of getting people to say, “Now THAT’S acting” — but overall it’s immensely effective work. We believe Gyllenhaal as a product of the streets who has become a world-class fighter. He looks really good in the ring.

Billy eventually loses everything — the people he loves, the title, the house, even his championship belts. Fortunately for him, Forest Whitaker’s Tick Wills runs just the kind of old-school neighborhood gym where a guy like Billy can find redemption and purpose.

From the moment Whitaker appears on screen, the role of Tick seems built for Best Supporting Actor talk, and the great one doesn’t disappoint. (A scene where Tick/Forest explains the deal with his messed-up eye is a tragicomic gem.)

Meanwhile, we’ve got 50 Cent as the obligatory charming/duplicitous fight promoter; the dashing Miguel Gomez as the dastardly, highly skilled opponent Miguel “Magic” Escobar; Skylan Brooks as the adorable street kid named “Hoppy” because his mom “liked the bunnies,” as he explains it, and Naomie Harris as an angelic social services counselor named, well, Angela. (Practically everybody in this movie should have been given less obvious names.)

As is the case with even the best boxing films, the fight scenes are wall-to-wall flurries of punches, with each blow sounding like a baseball bat thwacking a leather couch, and more blood than even the most lenient fight doctors would allow. That said, the matches are wildly entertaining, with Gyllenhaal snorting like a mad bull as he paces the ring, measuring his opponents and moving in for the knockout blow.

Even when we’re aware our emotions are being manipulated, we’re rooting hard for Billy Hope to beat the odds and climb the mountain, because have you seen how movie-adorable his daughter is? Don’t they deserve some happiness?

[s3r star=3.5/4]

The Weinstein Co. presents a film directed by Antoine Fuqua and written by Kurt Sutter. Running time: 124 minutes. Rated R (for language throughout, and some violence). Opens Friday at local theaters.

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