Parky At the Pictures (23/1/2026)

(Reviews of Heavyweight; and Another World)

HEAVYWEIGHT.

There have been a few boxing pictures lately. Alongside the biopics of George Foreman and Prince Naseem Hamed, George Tillman's Big George Foreman (2023) and Rowan Athale's Giant (2025), there have been grittier lower-rung sagas like Jack Huston's Day of the Fight (2023) and Sean Ellis's The Cut (2024), as well as women's boxing dramas like Halle Berry's Bruised (2020) and David Michôd's Christy (2025). Set in a single room and playing out in real time, Christopher M. Anthony's Heavyweight comes closer in tone to the Ellis and Huston outings, as it focusses on a contender in the moments before the biggest fight of his life.

Arriving at the venue to fight the undefeated champion, `Diamond' Derek Douglas (Jordan Bolger), is reassured by his trainer, Adam (Nicholas Pinnock), that he has earned his shot, even though he has only had 13 professional fights and is only facing Trevor Kingsley (Leon Paul Hodge) because two opponents had dropped out through injury. A TV interviewer asks if four weeks has been enough preparation time for the wildcard, as Derek makes his way to the locker room. But he snaps back that he is more than ready, even though he has doubts and feels guilty that he is about to step on to the big stage, when his boxer brother, Darius (Stefan Asante-Boateng) never got the chance.

Reaching the sanctuary of the changing room, Derek watches an undercard bout on the TV and wins a bet with chirpy Irish cornerman Robbie (Rob Malone), although he winces when the loser has to be rushed out of the ring on a stretcher. Just before TV producer Tom (Blake Harrison) pops in to shoot some silent backstage footage, Derek sees training partner Cain Ikande (Osy Ikhile) in the champ's dressing room and he's convinced that his friend given him their fight plan. Venue bouncer David (Joplin Sibtain) and Boxing Board rep Harry (George Asprey) admit it doesn't look good. But Adam swears that Cain would never betray a brother and gets Robbie to keep Derek calm, even though he's getting anxious because Darius is finishing a job before coming to the arena.

The tension rises when Adam tells Derek that they are sticking to their strategy and that he won't delay the ring walk to allow Darius some extra time. But they are interrupted by promoter, Freddie Goodman (Jason Isaacs), who wants Tom's camera to capture the meeting between Derek and film stars Diego (Orlando Norman) and Charlotte (Katya Hazel Boirand), who are keen to get social media snaps with the challenger. Derek plays along reluctantly, especially when Diego shows him a combination he could use in the ring. Freddie is unamused when they are ushered out by cutman Paul (Barry Aird), as they need to start getting Derek ready.

Suddenly, it's all activity, as everyone goes about their business. But Derek is twitchy because he hasn't heard from Darius and he punches the washroom mirror in frustration. Robbie spots glass in the cut and wants to call a doctor, but Adam gets Paul to work on the knuckles because they have all worked too hard to miss out on this chance of a lifetime.

They keep Cain waiting outside, when he turns up as the member of Kingsley's camp to monitor the wrapping of Derek's hands. Having just told the TV interviewer that he expects the champion to prevail, he seems surprised to receive a hostile reception. But Adam tells Derek not to rise to the bait when Cain taunts him about getting mauled, as he winds the tape around his fingers. However, Cain notices a difference in Adam's usual binding style and insists on having the hand exposed to reassure him that there's no foul play. Knowing the rules, Harry nods and the state of Derek's knuckles is revealed and Dr Collins (Sienna Guillory) is called to ensure the fight can go ahead. She is pressured by a furious Freddie into turning a blind eye, on the proviso that Derek sees her the moment the fight ends.

Adam is concerned that Cain will take the info back to his opponent, but he is more interested in getting answers into why he didn't get the gig. He accuses Adam of picking his favourite, when he is the senior fighters at their Brixton gym and is not injured, as the press had been informed. Derek snarls that he has earned the right, even though Cain had once had him on the canvas when they were amateurs. Digging back, Cain claims Darius was the better boxer and mocks the Douglas brothers for being brave battlers rather than genuine hopefuls. David tries to keep the men apart, but Harry settles matters by initialling Derek's tape and encouraging Cain to leave with him. Still aggrieved and feeling he's done nothing wrong by switching camps, Cain shoots Adam a reproachful look as he takes his leave.

With half an hour left, Adam works on getting Derek's head back in the game. He forces him to switch off his phone, even though Darius has not replied. However, his timing is off when he tries skipping to warm up and he ignores warnings not to over-exert when he shadow boxes, in case he pulls a muscle. Sneaking his phone into the loo, Derek calls his brother. But there's still no answer and Adam asks Robbie and Paul to leave so he can talk to his fighter in private. Sitting by the locked bathroom door, he tells Derek that Darius was the only other hungry young kid in his gym to have had the makings of a champion. But he sacrificed it all to protect his sibling from their brutal father and he urges him not to waste the opportunity that he had worked hard for 14 years to earn.

Opting not to pick up Darius's call, Derek emerges and lets Adam lace up his gloves. Tom is snitty because David refuses to let the camera in for a final sneak peak. But he hears the sound of pads being pounded and allows himself a wry smile because, after everthing, the fight is going to go ahead. The camera captures Derek slipping on his robe and edging along the corridor to make his ring walk. As the curtain opens and bright light floods in, the film ends with Adam telling Derek to go and win to say `thank you' to his brother.

With the drums driving Andy Burrows's score, this climactic shift from reflective to rousing is one of many excellent choices that the director makes in his debut feature. A former mixed-martial artist, Christopher M. Anthony offers shrewd insights into the preparation process and the pscychological pressure placed on a fighter before a bout. But the onetime visual effects supervisor and stunt designer also knows how to create images and he makes skilled use of Chas Appeti's camera to change angles and distances to make a talkie scenario that could easily work on stage feel wholly cinematic. Shooting in widescreen, he boldly employs close-ups to highlight character emotion and to reinforce the fact that, even though he is surrounded by his support team, Derek can only fulfil his goal alone.

Given how much exposition has to be conveyed through the dialogue, Anthony is astute enough to use secondary characters and the dressing-room TV to fill in the gaps. Despite staging the bulk of the action in one place, he also keeps the door open so that entrances and exits can impact the momentum of the action, as the promoter, doctor, traitor, TV producer, and the BBBC scrutineer change the mood in the camp.

The simplicity of Aimee Meek's set design and the efficiency of Eve Doherty's editing also play their part. But the sharpness of the byplay between the actors is down to Anthony's sense of timing, which atones for the fact that the backstory isn't that complelling and that the very nature of boxing movies means that it's impossible to avoid clichés and stereotypes. That said, the performances are spot on across the board, with the better-known faces unfussily melding with the ensemble and Nicholas Pinnock and Jordan Bolger lacing their intimacy and trust with the hint of underdog doubt that will persuade most viewers that Diamond Derek isn't another Italian Stallion.

It has to be said that it doesn't help Bolger's cause that so many around him are several inches taller. Stefan Asante-Boateng also looks much more imposing. But let's not forget that Mike Tyson was also 5ft 10in and he did okay for himself.

ANOTHER WORLD.

Hong Kong doesn't have much of a history when it comes to animation. Apart from the Older Master Cute (1981-83), Old Master Q (2003-11), and My Life As McDull (2001-14) franchises, the Special Administrative Region has only produced the occasional stand-alone title. Now, following on from A Chinese Ghost Story (1997), Dragonblade (2005), and Sherlock Holmes and the Great Escape (2019), comes Tommy Ng Kai-chung's Another World, which has been adapted by Polly Yeung from Naka Saijo's bestselling Japanese fantasy, Millennium Ghost. The problem is, the resulting film owes much more to Hayao Miyazaki than Te Wei.

Gudo (Chung Suet-ying) is a Soul Keeper who escorts spirits across Another World to their reincarnation. He agrees to help Yuri (Christy Choi Hiu-tung) find her lost brother, Kenji. He is also sent to watch over Princess Goran (Yeung Nga-man), who becomes the ruler of Flower City after the death of her father. Refusing to believe that he would commit suicide because of the wounds incurred in battle against Nyer, she blames her Uncle Yin and General Mok for his death and becomes a tyrannical ruler after Gudo shows her only a partial vision of her father's demise. Known as `the Ghost Princess', she vanishes and Flower City goes into steepling decline.

Goran is pursued by Dark Sky (Louis Cheung Kai-chung), whose duty is to kill the monstrous Wraths that form when the seed of evil located within everyone begins to flourish. He is prevented from taking Goran's soul by the goddess Mira (Kay Tse On-kei). She also gives Gudo the power to trawl the past to find out what happened to Yuri's brother, but warns him that he can only observe and cannot change anything that he witnesses.

Meanwhile, Keung (Will Or Wai-lam) absconds from Wheat Village to journey to Requiem Temple in order to find a Wrath to rid his neighbours of the Nyer overlords who use soldiers to keep them slaving in the fields without a fair share of their produce. He encounters Gudo, who overhears him praying to become a Wrath like Goran. However, he explains that she didn't become a Wrath at all, as she got to see the truth about her father's death and learned that he didn't blame her for her mother's childbirth demise. Indeed, he considered her a miracle and she sobs at his words, as she does the sight of Flower City being ablaze after being attacked by Nyer. Fearing for her life, she flees into the woods pursued by buzzing insects without the seed of evil within her, as it has been plucked by Gudo.

Keung still believes he will be best served by becoming a Wrath and hopes Dark Sky will be able to help him. But they are interrupted by a Wrath that Keung recognises as his friend, Duan, who had been subjected to a beating by the soldiers. Gudo shows Keung a vision of Duan becoming a Wrath after his wife and two daughters fell into a ravine from a rotting wooden rope bridge after being chased through the snow by wolves. He also defeats Wrath and plucks Keung's seed of evil, as he sees Duan choosing to cling to his family in their plunge rather than let rage overpower him. Despite losing an arm, Keung returns to Wheat Village to lead his neighbours in a protest at the citadel. The lord's archers refuse to fire on the people when they demand their rights. But they are lured into the barn and arrows fire down on them, with Keung also being hit.

Reuniting with Yuri, Gudo informs her that she is only in Another World because she is dead and he promises to lead her to reincarnation. However, she sees a vision of Kenji dying of starvation and their mother cooking him into a stew that Yuri eats. She is so aghast at this revelation that her seed of evil blossoms and Mira tells her that she is condemned to remain in Another World until she crumbles into dust. Gudo takes pity on her, however, and leads her into the forest in the hope that he can find a way to help her. After consulting Mother Earth, they cut a deal with Mira, who removes Yuri's seed and casts her into a thousand-year oblivion (along with Goran and Keung) and Gudo leads her across a series of stepping stones beside a waterfall that each erases a memory. Passing through the torrent into a cave, Gudo swears he will find the green-haired Yuri when her time is served. But he confesses to Dark Sky (who is now headless) that he is worried that he will let her down and his companion realises that Yuri is the knot of regret tied in Gudo's red chord that swims along the river of life (or something like that - who knows when the plot seems to make things up as it goes along and the English subtitles are so tiny beneath those in Mandarin).

Agreeing that Dark Sky can kill Yuri if she has turned into a Wrath, the pair go into the Underworld to find her. She is now called Ying and is working as a weaver in a factory with her sister, Nana, and brother, Hardy. Their overseer is strict and Nana falls to her death when Ying gets into an argument with her. Crushed by causing her sibling's death, Ying turns into a Wrath, in spite of Gudo's efforts to remind her of her past and their pledge. Dark Sky battles the Wrath, who has set the factory alight, and their titanic tussle ends with Gudo reaching into the carcass to pull Yuri to safety and remind her of their bargain. He plucks her seed and she returns to herself as Ying, with Hardy looking over her and she realises she has a second chance to be a sister if only she can forgive herself.

Running back through Another World, Yuri comes to find Gudo. However, his mask is cracked and he decides to ask Mari if he has done enough to earn his own shot at reincarnation. Seeing Yuri's tears, she agrees to let him be born into a Germanic looking town, where he is seen suckling as the film ends.

Well, Lord knows what that was all about. Obviously, the key themes the conflict between good and evil, the potency of grief, guilt, and redemption, and the mettle we must display in times of duress. But the subplots involving Goran and Keung clutter the central story about Yuri and Gudo, which has enough confusing moments of its own without them being compounded by flashbacks (or were they flashforwards) to the former's barbarous bloodiness and the latter's Hamlet-like hesitancy.

The visuals are striking, with the use of colour, light, and shadow being particularly notable. Indeed, a good deal of care and skill has gone into their creation. But the Ghibliesque ambience and graphic influence robs the picture of any essential Hong Kongness. The whole enterprise is, therefore, anime manqué in the same way that Pakistani debutant Usman Riaz's The Glassworker (2024) borrowed so heavily from Princess Mononoke (1997) and Spirited Away (2001).