Directed by: David Michôd
Distributed by: Black Bear
Written by Taylor Baker
30/100
David Michôd’s newest film, “Christy,” is a stilted biopic that hits familiar notes in an unflattering and altogether incohesive way. Almost each actor appears to be performing in a different film, giving the impression that they’re in a movie that isn’t really there. Sweeney is an adequate actress who has recently demonstrated a broader range with Ron Howard’s “Eden” this year and Michael Mohan’s “Immaculate” in 2024. She is game, but Michôd’s approach removes the titular character’s intimacy with the audience, ultimately depicting the role in a way that separates the sentiment at her core. This holds the audience at arm’s length and undermines a film built around bringing onlookers into the immediacy and emotionality of Christy’s day-to-day life and desires. Likewise, Ben Foster’s reductive character portrait of Christy’s ex-husband Jim befits more of a stage play than an athletic biopic.
With some decent fight choreography and dedicated turns by Merritt Weaver and Ethan Embry as Christy’s mother and father, this would-be redemption story amounts to little by the time we see Sweeney walk out and bump fists with the real-life Christy Martin in a brief cameo on her way to the ring. Michôd fails to make Christy’s athletic accomplishments erupt on screen; it lacks the dynamism and contains such an unembellished formula that “Christy” ends up worth less than the pieces it’s comprised of. Making another curiosity after Michôd’s “The King,” which similarly failed to succeed with a central performance by a budding star, Timothée Chalamet, “Christy” is an easy movie to root for, but a hard film to love, or even like. Whatever promise seemed poised to be fully unleashed in Michôd’s early work has dwindled.
“Christy” Trailer
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