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This film features a talented cast, telling the real-life story of Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle, who mentored a cheeky Sheffield teenager from Middle Eastern immigrant parents. Dubbed Naseem Hamed, the youngster was taught to confront racist bullies and transformed into a celebrity world champion in the 1990s. Ingle nurtured his flamboyant confidence and lethal fists, but after achieving wealth, Hamed turned against his coach, cutting him out and turning him into a blend of Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Performers and Roles

Brosnan plays the trainer; El-Masry embodies the role of Hamed, and Toby Stephens is the bullish promoter Frank Warren, who saw the potential that Ingle had discovered.

Film’s Shortcomings

Yet, the movie honestly lacks the fighter’s agility: the boxing sequences run smoothly, but the all-important story between them is repeatedly dull and one-note. It lacks nuance or contrast in the depiction of Hamed himself, and the actor, an otherwise outstanding performer, doesn’t get the opportunity to show any subtlety or much of what might make his role truly engaging – although he’s obviously been training and looks very plausible in the boxing arena.

Dialogue and Music Issues

The drama is repeatedly burdened by utilitarian, expositional lines that tell you precisely what is happening and what we are meant to feel (“Your journey began your boxing journey at age seven …”). This is the kind of script that streaming-TV producers call “double-screen”, making sure you know what’s going on while you’re viewing the movie but also glancing at your phone. And, the background music is overbearing, sometimes almost deafening, especially in the moment where the boxer gets too excited calling on Warren in his palatial home.

Performances and Key Moments

While El-Masry and Brosnan do their very utmost, their relationship doesn’t quite ignites, and the major fight scenes are frequently anticlimactically cut short. The most important moment is surely when, provoked beyond endurance in the training facility one day by the boxer as a delusional “old man”, the trainer in fact proposes to get in the ring and fight him. Everyone in the gym is stunned and uneasy. In what way is this insanely unwise confrontation going to play out? What will be the outcome? Surely the champion is going to defeat him? Or will he emotionally hold back? It’s not clear.

Highlights and Humor

That’s not to say that there aren’t some nice jabs. The actor gets laughs when his character tells a journalist what he’s instructing the kids from his neighborhood: to oppose prejudice and when you encounter a paedophile, “Hit them in the groin”. Amusing too when the boxer fidgets at the ridiculous antics Ingle makes him do in the beginning: posing as the “beast from the East”.

Plot and Conclusion

Regarding the falling out, the movie shows this as being exacerbated by a revealing publication that the trainer is supposed to have authored (a story element clearly modified from prior material), and there is an intriguingly conceived last discussion – however the heartfelt homage that the boxer is supposed to have paid to his mentor after his passing is merely referenced in the closing credits, and not dramatised on film. There is engaging content here, but the punches don’t land.

Giant was shown at the festival and is available in British and Irish theaters from 9 January.