Christy (MA) – 135 minutes

Christy Martin had to fight more than her opponents to reach the pinnacle of her sport – boxing.

A gay basketballer, the daughter of a miner, she was plucked from winning $300 in a Toughwoman bout she contested purely for the money to go on to fight for Don King.

In short, she put women’s boxing on the map in the USA. 

This is her warts and all story.

The film starts in West Virginia, which is where she was born Christine Renea Salters into a family with traditional values.

So it is was that her mother, in particular, didn’t countenance Christy’s relationship with another woman, Rosie (Jess Gabor), telling her to break it off.

It is 1987. After showing what she is made of by claiming the Toughwoman prize, Christy is – reluctantly at first – taken under the wing of trainer Jim Martin (Ben Foster).

In quick time, Jim recognises that this inexperienced young woman has an “X” factor.

She works hard and has the will to succeed.

Jim not only serves as Christy’s trainer, but inserts himself into her personal life.

The pair marries in 1991. Jim is 47 and Christy 22.

He continues as her trainer and she continues to win fights, eventually being introduced to the most prominent of boxing promoters, Don King.

By this time, on more than the odd occasion Jim has shown his true possessive, overbearing colours.

He can be verbally and physically abusive and has threatened to kill Christy if she does wrong by him.

Christy can’t turn to her parents because they think the sun shines out of Jim.

But the worst is yet to come.

Based on fact, Christy, the movie, tells a tough and gritty story.

It is one of triumph against considerable odds, with Sydney Sweeney largely throwing aside her Hollywood looks to get down and get dirty.

In other words, she goes against type and in large measure makes a decent fist of it (pun fully intended).

Wearing a bad blonde wig, Ben Foster has no trouble representing a low-down son of a b…., who sees in Christy a meal ticket.

The least convincing role in the piece is that of Merritt Wever, who is cast as Christy’s unconscionable mother Joyce.

Not for a second did I buy what she was selling. I found her totally miscast and lacking credibility in carrying the persona.

I did quite like the production design by Chad Keith, which took us back to the working class roots of the era. 

Christy is the work of Australian filmmaker David Michod (Animal Kingdom), who directs the movie and co-wrote the screenplay with Mirrah Foulkes (Judy & Punch).

It is based on a story by Katherine Fugate.

Having seen it, I wondered why I had not heard of Christy Martin before seeing the film.

So, it drew me in, but I felt the script needed tightening. It could readily have lost half an hour.

Rated MA, Christy scores a 7 out of 10.