The Giant Film Analysis: Prince Naseem Movie Starring Pierce Brosnan Misses the Impact

This film features a impressive ensemble, depicting the true story of Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle, who mentored a cheeky Sheffield teenager from Yemeni migrant parents. Known as Naseem Hamed, the fighter was coached to confront prejudice and molded into a media-friendly world champion in the late 90s. Ingle cultivated his flamboyant arrogance and lethal fists, but after achieving wealth, the boxer betrayed his coach, excluding him and making him a blend of John Falstaff and Broadway Danny Rose.

Performers and Roles

Brosnan portrays Ingle; El-Masry embodies the role of the prince, and Toby Stephens appears as the bullish promoter Warren, who recognized the potential that the coach had uncovered.

Where the Movie Falls Short

Yet, the film honestly lacks the fighter’s fancy footwork: the fight scenes flow well, but the all-important drama between them is repeatedly dull and one-note. It lacks subtlety or light and shade in the portrayal of the protagonist himself, and El-Masry, an otherwise excellent talent, isn’t given the opportunity to show any subtlety or much of what might make his character truly engaging – even though he’s obviously been working out and looks very plausible in the boxing arena.

Problems with Script and Sound

The drama is repeatedly lumbered with functional, explanatory lines that tell you precisely what is happening and what we are meant to feel (“Your journey began your career at seven years old …”). This is the sort of dialogue that streaming-TV producers call “double-screen”, ensuring you understand what’s unfolding while you’re viewing the movie but also glancing at your phone. And, the background music is overbearing, at times almost deafening, particularly in the moment where Hamed gets too excited calling on Warren in his luxurious residence.

Performances and Key Moments

While the leads do their very best, their dynamic never really ignites, and the major fight scenes are often anticlimactically cut short. A key scene is certainly when, provoked past his limit in the gym one day by Hamed as a misguided “elder”, the trainer in fact proposes to step into the ring and box him. Everyone in the room is shocked and uneasy. How exactly is this insanely risky confrontation going to play out? What will be the ending? Surely the Prince is going to kill him? Alternatively will he sentimentally pull his punches? The resolution remains ambiguous.

Bright Spots and Comedy

This isn’t to imply that there aren’t some nice jabs. Brosnan elicits humor when Ingle tells a reporter what he’s instructing the youths from his neighborhood: to reject bias and when you encounter a offender, “Punch him in the groin”. It’s funny too when the boxer squirms at the silly antics Ingle makes him do in the early days: acting like the “beast from the Middle East”.

Storyline and Final Thoughts

Regarding the falling out, the movie shows this as being worsened by a tell-all book that the trainer is supposed to have authored (a plot point evidently modified from prior material), and there is an interestingly conceived final conversation – although the heartfelt homage that Hamed is reportedly given to his mentor after his death is merely referenced in the closing credits, and not dramatised on film. Some interesting material here, but the blows don’t land.

Giant was shown at the festival and is available in UK and Irish cinemas from January 9.