51/100

Southpaw, directed by Antoine Faqua, is a universal story. Success, tragedy, hopelessness, quests for redemption; It's all here and in pristine focus. Unfortunately, the story that accompanies these engaging themes is nothing less than stale. Beat by beat, montage by montage, fight by fight; Southpaw clumsily and at times beautifully revels in the predictability of the situation that the film's characters are involved in.

However, no matter how well-oiled Southpaw is, the inconsistent direction and Faqua's inability to enhance the unsurprising narrative just weighs the entire experience down. Many conversations and intimate moments are shot awkwardly, almost as if the camera itself was a random passerby that quickly glanced at a privately intense moment between two people. And yet,…