Year: 2009
Running Time: 108 min. unrated/ 105 min. rated
Rated: PG-13
SRP:$ 39.99
Studio(s): Universal
Release Date: August 25, 2009

Film/Feature: C+
Could the film, Fighting reveal something new in it’s story about underground bare-knuckle fighting rings in the dingy corners of New York City? Nope. Can you predict what will happen nearly every step of the way? Probably. But that doesn’t make Fighting all that bad.

Harvey Boarden (Terrence Howard) is a known street hustler, born and raised to swindle those who don’t know better. He’s a transplant from Chicago, just trying to make ends meet and rise up the ranks in the local scoreboard for street cred. Then he sees something of himself in Shawn MacArthur (Channing Tatum), just another average bum living off the scraps and living in New York. How is it that the poorest people seem to find their way to the most expensive city in the country, I’ll never understand. This country is big enough to find more affordable lifestyles.

Anyway, Shawn gets roped into one of Harvey’s scams exploiting his brawling and grappling skills into the inner pits of bare-knuckle boxing. You see, Shawn grew up being the son of a hotshot collegiate wrestling coach and in some mysterious clouded incident, he went from being at the top of his game to nearly homeless in NYC. Shawn keeps winning fights, they both keep making money. Maybe he’ll take home the fine Latina working at the club, Zulay (Zulay Henao), maybe he’ll fight a rival fighter he grew up with, Evan Hailey (Brian White) and if they’re lucky, they can pull one over on underground promoter Jack Dancing (Roger Guenveur Smith) and Evan’s handler, Martinez (Luis Guzman).

There’s something about tired and trite films about people who fight for a living such a guilty pleasure. They play to a small crowd who’s willing to overlook most of the most contrived situations involving essentially the same people and parts of what makes up the B and C graded fight films as a whole. And they eat it up. I know because I’m one of these people and in some strange categorization within this genre, Fighting is not such a bad film. I’m willing to say the more martial arts/street fighter films you’ve seen, the more you’d actually like this. And if you’re choosy and save the very best films of this ilk for your low-carb-diet of fighting genre films, then this probably isn’t the film for you.

You can do a LOT worse, believe me, but here’s what’s good about Fighting: 1) Terrence Howard is a pretty endearing character, even though he’s a scam artist. He channels a strange accent that I personally have never experienced in Chicago. 2) Channing Tatum who is now recognizable from G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra, sells the fighting scenes very well, in the scope of street fights they hold up as believable and in his aloof demeanor is easy to latch onto. Smith and Guzman are standard and stock as the surprises found in a Cracker Jack box, but they’re still funny and Henao is pretty, damn fine, if I might say. Nothing guilty about that. This film knows exactly where it wants to go and gets their effectively and efficiently. So for that I give Fighting a slightly positive recommendation if you, too are a fighting genre fanatic. If not, then stick to Gymkata and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Video: A
One could definitely say lots of good things about how Fighting looks in Universal’s 1080p VC-1 encoded transfer in 1.85:1 aspect ratio. There’s a lot of skin in this film and all of the different ranges of skin tones look natural and balanced. Blacks are cave dark, sweaty skin is very noticeable and surrounding detail is clear. True colors have a feisty pop to them and there is not an apparent amount of edge enhancement, residual noise or artifacting. The picture is soft when it needs to be as intended by the director of photography Stefan Czapsky and crisp when you least expect it to be.

Audio: B+
Cranked up, the 5.1 English DTS-HD audio track will definitely lively up your joint during the fight scenes. It’s active, lively and does a good job of placing you in the streets of New York, an apartment with “living” noise (television, window open with street noise) that is directionally precise. The hip hop soundtrack provides some power boost to the LFE and some thrust behind punches. I found myself changing the volume quite a bit to hear the dialogue and then lowering it when the action started. Ideally I don’t like to do that so I have to dock it some for that. Still it’s more alive than most films and ultimately adds nicely to the overall experience. Other audio selections include: French, Spanish, 5.1 DTS Digital tracks and subtitles are available in English SDH, French and Spanish.

Extras: D
There are five Deleted Scenes (8:03) in high definition that add some more to some of the smaller characters especially Guzman’s Martinez, Zulay’s grandmother, and Zulay herself. They were cut for timing and pacing but I personally would have liked to have seen them incorporated into the film for some more depth.

The Unrated Version of the film is three minutes longer than the theatrical cut which I can really only see where the fight scenes are a bit longer. Seriously, there’s no reason not to watch the unrated version.

There’s a Digital Copy Disc for people on the go and who want to take the film in alternative methods than in just blu-ray.

There is BD-Live enabled and D-Box Motion Control if you got it but other than that, it’s leaves much to be desired.

Overall Shock Value: C-
Fighting is a film that will do just enough to satisfy fans of competitive wrestling, mixed martial arts and street brawling. It doesn’t have that delightful spring-out-of-your-seat moment for a pure martial arts fan like me would enjoy in say, a Tony Jaa film for example, but Terence Howard is likable as a shifty hustler, and Channing Tatum again is sufficient in keeping our interest. If you’ve seen B fighting movies, you’ve seen them all, but I think this vehicle has a bit different dressing that may incite people to pick it up, even if just as a rental. And yes, I’m joking about Gymkata.