🔗 Share this article

This film boasts a impressive cast, depicting the true story of Irish boxing trainer Ingle, who guided a brash Yorkshire youth from Yemeni immigrant parents. Known as Naseem Hamed, the youngster was coached to confront prejudice and transformed into a celebrity world champion in the late 90s. The trainer cultivated his flamboyant confidence and lethal fists, but after becoming rich, the boxer turned against his mentor, cutting him out and making him a mix of Falstaff and Danny Rose.

Performers and Roles

Brosnan portrays the trainer; Amir El-Masry embodies the part of Hamed, and Stephens appears as the bullish London promoter Frank Warren, who saw the goldmine that Ingle had discovered.

Film’s Shortcomings

However, the movie honestly misses the Prince’s agility: the boxing sequences flow well, but the all-important drama in between is repeatedly dull and monotonous. There is no nuance or light and shade in the depiction of Hamed himself, and the actor, an otherwise excellent talent, isn’t given the chance to display any depth or much of what might make his role truly engaging – even though he’s clearly been working out and appears convincing in the boxing arena.

Problems with Script and Sound

The story is repeatedly burdened by utilitarian, expositional dialogue that tell you exactly what is going on and what we are meant to feel (“You started your career at age seven …”). This is the kind of dialogue that digital producers call “second-screen”, ensuring you understand what’s unfolding while you’re watching the film but also checking your device. And, the background music is overbearing, at times almost deafening, particularly in the moment where Hamed gets overexcited visiting the promoter in his palatial home.

Acting and Pivotal Scenes

While El-Masry and Brosnan do their very best, their dynamic doesn’t quite comes to life, and the big set-piece boxing moments are frequently anticlimactically cut short. A key moment is certainly when, goaded past his limit in the training facility one day by the boxer as a misguided “elder”, the trainer in fact proposes to step into the ring and box him. Everyone in the room is shocked and uncomfortable. How exactly is this insanely risky standoff going to play out? How precisely the outcome? Certainly the champion is going to kill him? Alternatively will he sentimentally pull his punches? It’s not clear.

Bright Spots and Comedy

This isn’t to imply that there are no some nice jabs. The actor elicits humor when his character tells a journalist what he’s instructing the youths from his local community: to reject prejudice and when you meet a paedophile, “Punch him in the bollocks”. Amusing too when the boxer fidgets at the silly stunts the coach makes him do in the early days: acting like the “beast from the Middle East”.

Plot and Conclusion

As for the falling out, the movie depicts this as being worsened by a revealing book that the trainer is supposed to have written (a plot point evidently modified from another source), and there is an intriguingly imagined final conversation – although the emotional tribute that Hamed is reportedly given to Ingle after his passing is merely mentioned in the end titles, and not shown on screen. There is interesting material in this film, but the punches fail to connect.

Giant was shown at the London film festival and is in UK and Irish theaters from January 9.