Despite how cliched they can be, I tend to like fighting movies (see: Warrior and South Paw), and I particularly like when sports are used as metaphors for international relations (see: Bend it Like Beckham and Race). This movie caught my eye immediately: a boxer from Panama who fights an American legend during the height of the Panama Canal disputes (around the time Carter lost his re-election to Reagan).
That alone would have been enough for the movie: two boxers at the height of their careers fighting with vastly different styles and representing their own countries agendas in both an actual and a metaphorical fight. Unfortunately, the movie kept adding layers: there was an examination of poverty, as Roberto Duran was a street kid who learned to fight as a means of survival. Once he became overly wealthy, then, his transition into a different socio-economic class was hardly smooth. There was a discussion of the seedier sides of boxing, as both Duran and his American trainer, Ray Arcel, had suspicious dealings with shady characters.
In the end, the movie tried to cram in so much narrative that it felt overstuffed and bloated. At just under two hours, there simply wasn't enough time to develop the different narrative strands into a cohesive movie. All the different arcs seemed unrelated and the transitions between scenes could sometimes be jarring. Still, Edgar Rameriez made for a convincing fighter, and surprisingly Usher played Sugar Ray Leonard perfectly. It wasn't a terrible movie, so if you are inclined to like boxing movies, movies about South America, or Robert Deniro films, you could do worse than this. That said, it wouldn't be the one boxing movie from the last ten years I suggest anyone watch.
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