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This film features a impressive cast, telling the real-life story of Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle, who guided a cheeky Yorkshire teenager from Yemeni migrant family. Dubbed “Prince” Naseem Hamed, the fighter was coached to stand up to racist bullies and transformed into a media-friendly world champion in the late 90s. Ingle nurtured his flamboyant confidence and powerful punches, but after becoming rich, Hamed turned against his mentor, cutting him out and making him a mix of John Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Performers and Roles

Pierce Brosnan portrays Ingle; El-Masry embodies the part of Hamed, and Stephens appears as the bullish London promoter Frank Warren, who saw the potential that Ingle had uncovered.

Where the Movie Falls Short

However, the film honestly lacks the fighter’s fancy footwork: the boxing sequences flow well, but the crucial drama between them is consistently flat and monotonous. There is no nuance or light and shade in the portrayal of the protagonist himself, and the actor, an otherwise outstanding performer, isn’t given the opportunity to show any depth or much of what might make his role really interesting – even though he’s clearly been working out and looks very plausible in the boxing arena.

Dialogue and Music Issues

The story is often burdened by functional, expositional dialogue that inform you precisely what is happening and what we are meant to feel (“You started your career at seven years old …”). It is the sort of script that streaming-TV producers call “double-screen”, ensuring you know what’s unfolding while you’re watching the movie but also checking your device. And, the score is overpowering, at times almost deafening, especially in the scene where the boxer gets too excited visiting Warren in his palatial residence.

Acting and Pivotal Scenes

While El-Masry and Brosnan do their considerable best, their relationship doesn’t quite comes to life, and the big set-piece boxing moments are frequently disappointingly cut short. The most important moment is certainly when, provoked beyond endurance in the training facility one day by the boxer as a delusional “elder”, Ingle in fact offers to step into the ring and box him. All present in the room is shocked and uncomfortable. In what way is this extremely risky standoff going to unfold? How precisely the ending? Surely the Prince is going to kill him? Or will he emotionally pull his punches? The resolution remains ambiguous.

Bright Spots and Comedy

That’s not to say that there aren’t some nice jabs. The actor gets laughs when Ingle informs a reporter what he’s instructing the kids from his local community: to reject bias and when you meet a offender, “Hit them in the groin”. Amusing too when Hamed fidgets at the silly stunts the coach makes him do in the early days: acting like the “beast from the East”.

Plot and Conclusion

As for the rift, the film depicts this as being exacerbated by a revealing publication that Ingle is supposed to have authored (a story element evidently adapted from prior material), and there is an interestingly imagined final conversation – although the heartfelt homage that the boxer is supposed to have given to Ingle after his death is merely referenced in the closing credits, and not dramatised on film. There is engaging content here, but the punches don’t land.

The film was shown at the festival and is available in British and Irish cinemas from 9 January.