Director and co-writer David Michôd’s biographical boxing drama Christy barely gets away with a split decision. Thanks to some outstanding lead performances and a well drawn period setting, this recounting of the life and career of female boxer Christy Martin is able to occasionally save itself from drowning in predictable cliches. Whenever Christy leans into showy melodrama, the film staggers, but in the moments designed to highlight the titular figure’s strength, determination, and flaws, Michôd’s work is quite captivating. But to get to those moments, Christy has to wade through a lot of leaden moments.
Born Christy Salters in small town West Virginia, Martin (Sydney Sweeney) dips her toe into the boxing world by participating in exhibition fights on weekends. Eventually promoters and trainers start to take notice, and Christy shows potential to shift her athletic career from the basketball court to the boxing ring full time. Slowly, she wins over the mind and heart of her cantankerous trainer, Jim Martin (Ben Foster), with the two becoming an inseparable item outside the ring. Jim fixes his wagon to Christy’s successes, and times are financially tight in the early years of their partnership. Christy’s big breakthrough comes when legendary fight promoter Don King (an outstanding Chad Coleman) books her on the undercard of a Mike Tyson fight in the mid 90s. From there, Christy becomes the most widely recognizable female boxer in the world. But Jim’s abusive nature, mutual addictions, aging, and Christy’s closeted lesbianism all threaten to put a stop to her career.
It’s clear from the outset that Christy is going to be treading on some familiar ground. Christy’s mother, Joyce (played hammily by Merritt Weaver), is the stereotypical bigoted parent who demands her daughter stop being queer. Joyce squarely places the blame for all of Christy’s problems at her daughter’s feet, even when confronted with evidence that staying with the increasingly volatile and drug addled Jim could quite literally kill her. Ethan Embry plays Christy’s father as a quiet, blue collar kind of guy who lets his wife do all the talking. Whenever these characters come back into the story, the viewer knows precisely what to expect from them without deviation, and they serve as great examples of the film’s inability to separate melodrama from realistic tensions. Both play archetypes, and neither makes much of an impression, but they do set the tone that Michôd (Animal Kingdom, The Rover, The King) seems to be going for with Christy: bleak, but pitched enough towards the middle-of-the-road that it won’t turn audiences off from watching it. It wants to make the dark reality of Martin’s life relatable to the widest audience possible, but holding back until the very end to risk alienating the viewer, talking down to them a bit in the process. (That being said, the scene where Christy’s relationship with Jim hits a point of no return is unnerving and bone chilling.)
There’s no ambiguity or subtext to be found in Michôd and co-writer Mirrah Foulkes’ script, leading to a movie where every twist, wrinkle, and punch can be telegraphed well in advance. This makes Christy appear a lot less exciting of a biopic than one might expect, especially when coupled with Michôd’s fondness for staging lengthy sequences that drag on interminably. Minutes of time feel longer than they actually are because Michôd looks to be actively fighting against the kind of telegraphed melodrama that’s endemic to this genre. He will, eventually, have to give into those melodramatic touches to keep Christy moving along, making one wonder what the point was in dawdling.
It could be because Sweeney and Foster are putting in tremendous work in front of the camera, and it’s as good a reason as any for why Michôd keeps the movie at a perpetually slow simmer. Although neither performer appears to age very much across a story that spans decades of these peoples’ lives, both approach their characters like people who’ve been wearing masks their entire life. As the loathsome Jim, Foster acutely plays the abusive, jealous husband role like a stone cold sociopath who only takes notice of things when it’s to his advantage. And in his depiction of Jim as a trainer, Foster is the definition of someone who teaches because they can’t do anything themselves. Foster is bringing a lot of the darkness and discomfort that the script lacks, and the film is better for his contributions.
For her part in the lead, Sweeney gets one of her best chances yet to show off her underrated range. In a lot of her recent work, Sweeney has proven to audiences that she’s more than willing to push and challenge herself with fully committed performances, and Christy Martin is no exception. There’s equal parts shyness and fire to Christy Martin that makes her a compelling character. She’s driven to excel in her career by the promise of riches and fame, but also by a desire to leave her old life behind and repress feelings that mom tried to berate out of her. Whether she’s portraying Christy at a high (or cocky, self-perceived high) or low point in life, Sweeney provides impeccable character work, willing to disappear into the character in totality. She’s more than capable of standing toe-to-toe with Foster’s intensity, and shows a lot of grace and vulnerability in scenes opposite Christy’s lifelong crush (Jess Gabor), an in-ring rival turned close friend (Katy O’Brien), or the concerned manager (Bryan Hibbard) of the gym she co-owns with her husband. The film revolves so much around Christy’s relationship to her husband and family that these moments away from those perspectives are refreshing and captivating to behold.
It’s the contributions of the film’s cast and production design team that eke out a win for Christy. Michôd’s adherence to formulaic storytelling never impresses, but the film boasts a lived in experience that elevates the material from falling into total boredom. Sweeney and Foster, in particular, are so magnetic to watch that they are able to carry the viewer across a number of boring, overwrought, or redundant sections in an overlong movie. The material doesn’t feel fully formed here, but many of the performances and the look of the late 90s and early 2000s boxing world are precisely calculated. If the film were a boxer, one might say it has a lousy punch, but a lot of great footwork.
Christy opens in theatres everywhere on Friday, November 7, 2025. Christy screened as part of the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival.
