‘Baby’ boasts trio at the top of its game

ALLEN MACDONALD

Clint Eastwood’s “Million Dollar Baby” is more than a movie; it’s a

remarkable filmmaking achievement. It is a bare-boned, stripped-down

study of flawed people who desperately want to make a human

connection but often let a lifetime’s worth of rejection, guilt and

disappointment muddy up the water. It is, quite plainly, a simple

story well told and well acted by an ensemble at the top of its game.

When the cast boasts Clint Eastwood, Hilary Swank and Morgan

Freeman, you cannot possibly expect to be bored. These are actors

that hit you at your very core. As a viewer, you cannot help but

identify with them. You make an attachment, and you are willing to

follow them wherever the story takes you.

Frankie Dunn (Eastwood) owns a boxing gym that has spent the last

few decades in disrepair. Frankie ‘likes the stink’ and sees the

dilapidation as a badge of honor. Frankie has been a boxing

trainer/manager for a few decades since giving up his work as one of

the best “cut men” in the boxing world. That is, he had a gift for

patching up the vicious cuts one receives in the ring, stopping the

bleeding long enough for a boxer to get through the fight.

The gym is Frankie’s place of work, but for Scrap (Freeman), it’s

home, too. Scrap is a former boxer and longtime friend of Frankie who

had his shot at a title but was forced to retire after the loss of an

eye. Over the years Frankie has brought several talented fighters to

the brink of greatness, only to have them abandon him just as they

were about to step into it.

A lesser movie would paint them as the bad guys, but not this one.

Eastwood knows everything is shades of gray and paints them as such

-- these fighters leave because Eastwood doesn’t know how to loosen

the reins. He’s overly cautious and holds his fighters back long

after they’re ready to go pro.

Enter Maggie Fitzgerald, an aspiring boxing contender who has come

all the way out to California to pursue this single dream. She

doesn’t even know if she’s talented at boxing; she simply knows that

it’s something she has to do and has put all her eggs in this basket.

Maggie has bet the house on her own merit, a wager her family would

frown upon, because they are not about encouraging self-esteem.

A bold Maggie approaches a recalcitrant Frankie about training

her, something he wants nothing to do with, and he isn’t afraid of

mincing his words: “I don’t train girls.” However, Maggie doesn’t

give up and continues to work out on her own at the gym, making her

presence known with pure perseverance, until Scrap nudges a weakening

Frankie into taking her on.

With Frankie’s diligent training prowess and Maggie’s right hook,

they slowly claw their way up into the boxing world. To tell more

would betray this film’s integrity. I will say only this: This film

appears and is being marketed as being in the vein of “Rocky” and

“The Karate Kid,” but it is so much more than that. It is an

incisive, observant work that lives and breathes in its nuance and

understatement. You will be moved.

A lot has been made of Eastwood’s maturation as a filmmaker in the

last 15 years. In my opinion, he has always been phenomenal -- my

grandfather was a devout fan of his mid-’70s directorial effort “The

Outlaw Josey Wales,” and tried to muster some enthusiasm in me that I

probably wasn’t quite old enough to appreciate. Eastwood has always

been most comfortable in the dark corners of the human psyche,

literally stripping his characters down in the shadows, where they

often feel the safest.

He is very deliberate in his choice of images, often casting faces

in shadow and thereby giving their presence a weight we wouldn’t

notice if their faces were completely visible to us. He keeps the

editing pace slow but tight -- so we’re sure to soak up the

interpersonal dynamics of his ensemble. I will unapologetically jump

on the bandwagon and deem this the best film he has made; it’s also

the best performance he’s ever given. Eastwood has never been afraid

of his age nor using his weathered face to convey a man who, in this

film, has been put through the ringer, yet somehow always finds the

strength within himself to climb back to his feet before the count

reaches 10.

Hilary Swank again displays the talent she unveiled in 1999’s

“Boys Don’t Cry,” where she played a girl masquerading as a boy. She

always hits pitch-perfect notes and never seems forced. Swank infuses

Maggie with a quiet reservoir of strength you know she had to draw on

to escape the chains of a welfare-dependent family in Appalachia. She

has no choice but to pursue her dream, because to fall back into the

demons of her past would destroy her anyway; nothing is more

frightening to her than that which she left behind.

Morgan Freeman narrates the film with the same sagacious charm he

brought to 1994’s “The Shawshank Redemption.” It’s a credit to Paul

Haggis’ script that he pulls off the narration. It’s usually frowned

upon in contemporary movies, because it’s often utilized as a crutch

-- telling the audience what the filmmaker is too lazy to show. But

Haggis’ sparse dialogue allows the images to set the tone; he instead

uses the narration to sprinkle in Scrap’s cautious hope.

And Eastwood and Freeman together create one of the most

believable friendships I have ever seen committed to film. Their

playful jousting and ribbing convey a long, sometimes bumpy

friendship. Their silences are loud -- their history and loyalty are

elephants in the room.

“Million Dollar Baby” also has very poignant metaphors. Scrap

tells us early on that a fighter needs both heart and a killer hook,

but not too much, because a fighter who is all heart is destined to

take a beating. There are two secondary characters who symbolize

these two extremes, and the scene where they’re in the ring together

is the most telling of what Eastwood and Haggis are saying about

people.

This particular scene is about the strong mercilessly beating on

the weak, and the way in which Scrap handles himself in it makes it

one of the most memorable.

It’s also no accident that Frankie’s a “cut man,” because the bond

forged between he and Maggie allows them to each patch the other up

when they’ve been injured and stop the bleeding so they can move on.

Along with “Sideways,” I consider “Million Dollar Baby” to be the

best movie of the year. They will both surely be best picture

nominees. The former roots its humor in pain; this one wears it under

Frankie’s protective veneer of sarcasm. Both will find their way

under your skin and break your heart.

* ALLEN MacDONALD, 30, recently earned a master’s in screenwriting

from the American Film Institute in Los Angeles.

‘Sideways’ a move in the right direction

Every so often, a film comes from out of nowhere that immediately

resonates with the movie going public.

These films usually “have legs,” which means the box office

receipts keep building over time as word-of-mouth prompts more and

more people to see them. Such a film is Alexander Payne’s “Sideways,”

now playing in somewhat limited release.

Payne, who also directed “About Schmidt,” has crafted a

slice-of-life film about real adults groping their way through life

the best they can. Although primarily a comedy, “Sideways” offers the

gamut of human emotions via fully fleshed-out characters who are

uniformly believable.

Besides directing “Sideways,” Payne adapted the screenplay, a dual

role he also filled for “About Schmidt.”

“Sideways” stars Paul Giamatti, perhaps the most underrated and

relatively unknown actor working. Giamatti has been working in films

steadily since the early 1990s and has appeared in a few well-known

films, including “Saving Private Ryan.”

However, he has made his living playing mostly supporting roles

with the occasional lead in small independent films.

Giamatti usually plays somewhat quirky characters, and Miles

Raymond, the principal role in “Sideways,” is no exception. Miles is

a nerdy, down-at-the-heels middle school English teacher with one

failed marriage and many failed novels behind him.

Miles fancies himself an oenophile but is in reality a horrible

wine snob whose effusive praise of the grape is flimsy subterfuge for

his problematic drinking.

Miles is slated to be the best man in the wedding of his former

college roommate Jack (Thomas Haden Church). Miles and Jack set out

on a weeklong trip to Santa Barbara wine country as sort of a

prolonged bachelor party the week before the wedding.

Jack is the polar opposite of Miles: a good-looking actor of

limited success who oozes personality and charm. Unbeknownst to

Miles, Jack’s main priority is to have as many casual sexual

encounters as possible before his nuptials. It soon becomes clear

that Jack’s biggest worry is that Miles’ morose demeanor and slovenly

appearance will get in the way of fulfilling this goal.

Miles tries to ignore Jack’s shenanigans as long as possible and

keeps pushing his crash course in wine appreciation. However, the

irrepressible Jack soon sets up a double-date with Maya (Virginia

Madsen), a waitress at one of Miles’ favorite wine country

restaurants, the Hitching Post, and Stephanie (Sandra Oh), a “pour

girl” they met while wine tasting.

Miles has always been attracted to Maya during his previous visits

to the Hitching Post. From past conversations, Miles learned Maya is

married to a philosophy professor from a nearby university. Of

course, lady-killer Jack is able to find out in a brief conversation

that Maya is separated and, for some reason, actually likes Miles.

Dining at a gourmet restaurant recommended by the women, Jack and

Stephanie instantly hit it off, and Miles and Maya are left to their

own devices. In a brilliant scene at the restaurant, the immediate

emotional and physical bond developed by Jack and Stephanie, and

Miles’ descent into an alcoholic funk while a sensitive Maya looks

on, is conveyed solely by camera angles and muffled conversation. It

is a powerful scene where a skilled director is able to portray a

varied tableau of human emotion without resorting to stilted

dialogue.

As the restaurant closes, Stephanie suggests the group move on to

her house. There she and Jack sequester themselves and leave Miles

and Maya in an adjacent room. As they try to ignore the obvious

sounds of Jack and Stephanie’s lovemaking, Miles and Maya discuss

their love of wine. It is during this scene that some of the most

heartbreaking and human dialogue heard in recent movies takes place.

When asked why he prefers pinot noir wine, Miles discusses the

grape’s thin skin and resulting vulnerability, how it cannot tolerate

extreme heat or cold, humidity or dryness. Maya realizes he is really

speaking about himself, and she begins to love him.

The movie wouldn’t be true to the characters if the road to love

were straight and true. Of course there are many twists and turns for

the characters later in the film that I won’t give away here. The

screenplay is always true to these characters we come to know, and

every unfolding scenario feels right.

“Sideways” has deservedly received seven Golden Globe nominations,

the most by any single film this year. The nominations include best

picture, best director and best screenplay for Payne, and acting nods

for Giamatti, Church and Madsen. Films contending for awards are

released en masse at the end of the year, and there are many playing

in local theaters. In the face of many good choices, you will not

regret buying a ticket for “Sideways.”

* VAN NOVACK, 50, is the director of institutional research at Cal

State Long Beach and lives in Huntington Beach with his wife

Elizabeth.