Wahlberg's passion project The Fighter is a real barnburner

It took four years, three directors and numerous stop-starts before Mark Wahlberg's biopic on boxer `Irish' Mickey Ward was able to get out of the gym and into the ring. Thankfully, it's worth the weight.

Wahlberg (who also serves as executive producer) plays 31-year-old Micky Ward who works as a road worker in Lowell, Massachusetts and is an amateur boxer hoping to shed his reputation as a `stepping stone' fighter. But the clock is ticking and after four straight losses it's now or never for Micky to live up to his older brother Dicky (Christian Bale) who once knocked down Hall of Famer Sugar Ray Robinson. Dicky is also Micky's trainer, but spends more time chasing the dragon in the local crackhouse than actually honing the skills of his younger brother. Also in Micky's corner is his domineering mother Alice (Melissa Leo), who doubles as his manager, and a total of seven sisters, with 11 heads between them. The younger Ward brother is the family's meal ticket and the pressure on him is great, with Alice summing it up best by saying "all I ever wanted was for you to be world champion.''

It's a depressing cycle, as Micky's talent is evident, but every time he tries to break out of the downward family spiral and make something of himself, he gets sucked back in. It takes sassy barwoman and college dropout Charlene (Amy Adams), who opens her legs and heart to Micky, to make him realise his dysfunctional family might not have his best interests at heart. As a boxer, Micky Ward is best known for fighting one of the great trilogies in boxing history with Arturo Gatti. However, The Fighter is set before Ward goes pro and is less of a sporting drama, than it is a family one. It would be easy to write it off as your typical underdog sporting story, but few people who enter the film will leave with that attitude. The most obvious element in its filmic arsenal are the performances - with Bale spine tingling as the erratic and crack cocaine addicted brother. In fact, he's so convincing as a crackhead it makes you wonder just what it is he does during his down time between films. Although Bale's acting talent outside of action blockbusters is no secret to fans of The Machinist, The Prestige, American Psycho and The New World, his portrayal is beyond worthy of the best supporting actor Oscar. Despite Bale's physical transformation to embody the unhealthy physicality of Dicky, his flamboyant and unbridled performance is quite simply a career best.

Wahlberg too is at his finest with a more restrained and understated role which is the heart of the film. He also does the Bale shapeshifter, by packing on weight to his famous abs mid film (sob), before trimming down and adding muscle to seemingly every part of his body. It's easy to see why Leo and Adams (along with Bale and Wahlberg) both received Golden Globe nominations for their supporting roles, with Adams in particular shedding her sweetheart image with more f-words than a 50 Cent tweet.Perhaps the real star of The Fighter is director David O'Russell, who delivers an absolute haymaker of a film. His third collaboration with Wahlberg, after Three Kings and I Heart Huckabees, O'Russell's product is a collage of greatness mixing documentary elements and confronting close-ups with stills and balls-out creative shots. From the unexpected tracking shots and angles to genius continuous shots, as a director he has mixed his indie filmmaking sensibilities with the conventions of the genre to make a sporting film that extends beyond its reach. Even the fight scenes in the ring, although beautifully constructed and toe-to-toe with anything from the greatest boxing films like Rocky or Raging Bull, act more as a Bolo Punch while the out-of-ring drama delivers the knockout. When other directors could have taken Dicky's addiction and imprisonment to a dark place, O'Russell brings in comedic elements without losing the significance of the situation.

Although the general flawlessness of The Fighter is continuous throughout the film, perhaps it's only at the end credits when real life footage of the brothers is played that you realise just how purely the film captures this remarkable true story. If this reviewer had to go to the scorecards, The Fighter is a 10/10. The Fighter is out in Australia on Jan 27 and the rest of the lucky world already have their mitts on it.