There’s been 9,000,000 boxing movies at this point. If you want to stand out, you need to try something different to stand out in any way outside of an actor showing off how physical they got for the role. The Fire Inside knows this, and smartly takes the boxing road less traveled, making it stand out just a little bit more in both the Oscar field and the boxing movie field. Plus, anytime a character is nicknamed T-Rex, you gotta make at movie about them.
T-Rex is Claressa Shields (Ryan Destiny), a girl living in Flint, Michigan. Saddled with an absentee dad, drug addicted mom Mickey (Oluniké Adeliyi), and basically mothering her siblings, Claressa takes solace at the local boxing gym. Coach Jason Crutchfield (Brian Tyree Henry) takes a shine to the poor girl, and starts training Claressa. That training sparks something, transforming Shields into T-Rex in the boxing ring, a persona that can hopefully take her to the 2012 Olympics in London.
The Fire Inside’s set up is one we’ve seen before. It’s basically girl Rocky, with the awkward Claressa coming into her own as boxing disciplines her and raises her confidence. Rachel Morrison swiftly sets up how Claressa becomes T-Rex, showing the dilapidated Flint housing she runs through for training, and even more depressing home life she returns to. The boxing ring is the least scary part of her days, and someone’s trying to beat Claressa up in there! We get ESPN highlights versions of boxing matches, as Morrison briskly gets us to where we think the story is really going: the 2012 Olympic Games. Along the way, if you can’t tell already, we fly through the ups and downs of a traditional sports movie, with the winning Ryan Destiny and Brian Tyree Henry efficiently showing the audience why we should be rooting for them. The Fire Inside could have settled for telling Claressa’s rise to the heights of female boxing, going where no female boxer had ever gone before.
But all that rushing through the 2012 games (we’re done with it in about 45 minutes) is because that’s when The Fire Inside’s real story starts. All that hard work, discipline, sacrifice…all for Claressa and Jaosn to end up right back where they started. I wish we had gotten through 2012 with just an extended opening credits sequence, because of how fascinating this part of the movie is. Claressa and Jason both hit walls. Jason thought it was going to be easy transitioning from boxing coach to advertising agent, but finds that female boxers aren’t exactly beacons of light for advertising executives. Claressa’s wall is even thicker: she’s the hero of the community, of which her mom, now unabsent dad (Adam Clark) brother Peanut (Sekhai Jayden Smith), and now pregnant sister Briana (Shechinah Mpumlwana), are relying on her to provide for them. So those temporary side hustles and boxing training don’t feel quite as temporary anymore, and with zero payoff. Plus, Claressa is getting attention from Ze (Idrissa Sanogo) and other boys she likes since she’s still a teenager, making her question her commitment to boxing. You can feel the anger and pain inside Jason and Claressa as they feel betrayed by their success, causing strain on their relationship, both personal and professional. Great sports movies today use sport success as a side story to a more interesting main tale, and The Fire Inside’s 2nd half is what makes the movie something more special than the other generic fare out there.
Regardless, Ryan Destiny and Brian Tyree Henry make The Fire Inside just a joy of an experience to watch. Around the holidays you want to watch good people rise up and be rewarded for their decency, which mostly happens in this film. And if you’re worried about Jason and Claressa, Rachel Morrison’s movie, and the title, show that these two are gonna overcome any bumps that come in their way. The end title credits will rouse you out of your seats, fired up about one of the true great athletes in the US, the T-Rex!