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This film features a talented cast, depicting the true tale of Irish boxing trainer Ingle, who mentored a brash Yorkshire youth from Yemeni migrant parents. Known as “Prince” Naseem Hamed, the youngster was taught to stand up to prejudice and transformed into a media-friendly titleholder in the 1990s. Ingle nurtured his flamboyant confidence and lethal fists, but after becoming rich, Hamed betrayed his coach, excluding him and turning him into a blend of Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Cast and Characters

Pierce Brosnan portrays Ingle; Amir El-Masry embodies the role of the prince, and Stephens appears as the bullish London promoter Frank Warren, who saw the potential that Ingle had discovered.

Where the Movie Falls Short

Yet, the movie honestly misses the fighter’s fancy footwork: the fight scenes run smoothly, but the crucial story in between is consistently flat and one-note. It lacks subtlety or contrast in the portrayal of the protagonist himself, and El-Masry, an otherwise outstanding performer, isn’t given the opportunity to display any depth or much of what might make his character truly engaging – even though he’s obviously been training and appears convincing in the ring.

Dialogue and Music Issues

The story is repeatedly burdened by functional, expositional dialogue that inform you exactly what is going on and what we are supposed to be thinking (“You started your boxing journey at seven years old …”). It is the kind of dialogue that streaming-TV executives call “double-screen”, making sure you understand what’s unfolding while you’re viewing the film but also checking your phone. Additionally, the background music is overbearing, sometimes almost deafening, especially in the moment where the boxer gets overexcited visiting the promoter in his palatial residence.

Performances and Key Moments

While the leads do their considerable best, their dynamic never really ignites, and the big set-piece fight scenes are frequently anticlimactically truncated. A key scene is certainly when, provoked beyond endurance in the gym one day by Hamed as a misguided “old man”, Ingle actually offers to get in the ring and fight him. All present in the room is stunned and uneasy. In what way is this insanely risky standoff going to play out? How precisely the ending? Certainly the champion is going to kill him? Alternatively will he emotionally hold back? The resolution remains ambiguous.

Bright Spots and Comedy

That’s not to say that there are no some good moments. The actor gets laughs when his character informs a journalist what he’s instructing the youths from his local community: to oppose prejudice and when you meet a paedophile, “Hit them in the bollocks”. Amusing too when Hamed squirms at the silly antics the coach makes him do in the beginning: posing as the “beast from the Middle East”.

Plot and Conclusion

As for the falling out, the movie depicts this as being worsened by a revealing publication that the trainer is allegedly authored (a plot point clearly adapted from prior material), and there is an intriguingly imagined last discussion – although the emotional tribute that the boxer is reportedly given to his mentor after his death is only referenced in the closing credits, and not dramatised on screen. There is interesting material in this film, but the punches don’t land.

The film screened at the festival and is in UK and Irish cinemas from 9 January.