Cagefighter

This movie was just laughably bad. The only thing less realistic are the reviews giving it 10 stars. In fact, the three stars I gave it were generous. It is boring. It is a poor man's Rocky. The acting of Chuck and Luke was better than everybody but Gina. Well, actually Moxley played a good pro wrestler. Go figure. Absolutely nothing original.

The movie follows the path of the usual underdog story. The green screen effects seem very off often. The movie does not not make any new innovations in "the underdog plot" causing it to become very stale and predictable. The only person in this movie who is entertaining is Jonathan Good who acts with a lot of conviction. The fight scenes however are also a big plus as they are very well choreographed. Overall, an inoffensive film with a pro-wrestler as it's best actor (no wonder).

Cagefighter: Worlds Collide directed by Jesse Quinones and starring newcomer Alex Montagnani as Reiss Gibbons, is a breath of fresh air in the world of combat sports movies!

Jesse has a good style of directing with the pace feeling very well balanced throughout yet not rushed which can be difficult to pull off with fight movies & Alex is very likeable as Reiss, he's got a good heart and you want to see him win!

The movie also has Legendary Combat Sports talents such as Chuck Liddell, Luke Rockhold, Jonathan Good aka Jon Moxley and Jay Reso aka Christian, who all churn out solid performances in their very fitting roles!

Liddell is perfect in his role as Reiss's trainer Marcus and exhibits dramatic chops which will surprise people. Rockhold plays his role well as the pushy glory hunting trainer, Moxley is electric, crushing it as the larger than life smack talking superstar wrestling protagonist who demands respect and is happy to prove he belongs in the cage & Reso is brilliant as this worlds Joe Rogan/ Ariel Helwani type character!

Elijah Baker and Georgia Bradner offer great performances as Reiss 's quick witted manager and Reiss's loving partner & Gina Gershon totally owns her role as the tough as old boots Max Black, owner of Legends which feels like this worlds equivalent of the UFC!

This movie offers realistic fight scenes, good drama and a true insight into the world of MMA that we rarely get to see depicted on screen!

I'd happily see a sequel as this exciting world they've created with intriguing characters is certainly worth further exploring and delving deeper into!

Roll on a sequel, I wanna see that 3rd fight!

I had never heard of this movie before. Only found about it a couple days ago, wich is 5 years after release. Jon Moxley (FKA Dean Ambrose) did an MMA movie? I had to watch that.

Now the funniest part is that he would be a lot more credible in this super badass vilain of pro wrestling role with his current look in the Deathriders. He got a lot more ripped. They keep saying how powerful he is in the movie and so on, but thats really 2020 Mox that is not that "impressive looking". But whatever...

So the movie follow a very conventional structure. Basically you saw this movie before only with different characters. But i don't think it was meant to be original. Sure adding some wrestlers and the idea of a wrestling champ challenging an MMA champ is the "little bit of originality" in it, but that do not play a huge part. The rest of the movie follow the same structure you seen a million time. But that does not mean it can't be entertaining.

Yes the fights are completely unrealistic and the referee would had end them 5x times before the actual end, but hey its a movie, and if you enjoyed Rocky receiving 120 punch to the face per movie, you can suspend your disbelief here too.

Speaking of 5 times, its a recurring thing in the movie that the MMA champ is a 5 times champion, but its actually that he defended the belt 5 times. It was kinda confusing at first and i tought it was an error in translation but reading other reviews it seem not, its like that in the original english version too.

The version i watched was in french and outside the main character and Gina Gershon wich were ok, most of the dubbing was awful, especially Mox and Christian Cage.

Overall it was a modest little fight movie that i had no idea existed and it gave me 90 minutes of alright fun with a couple beers. Nothing to write home about but decent enough.

One last thing... Its a little weird tough that they use AEW footage, some wrestlers play themselves, but then you have Jon Moxley (with litterally his trademark at the time Mox jacket) but he is call Randy Stone here? I guess they wanted to save on cost so it was easy to use old footage. But i do think they should had gave the wrestlers characters names.

Movie starts with a bit tacky fight and the commentators calling it 'one of the greats' but if commentators are known for one thing, that is to exaggerate or over-amplify situations or events. We are introduced to the protagonist Reiss Gibbons, he's a successful MMA wrestler and has a undefeated streaks with 5 championships. When Company promoter Max Black pits him against a pro wrestling superstar Randy Orton.... ohh Stone in the company's first ever cross-promotional event, he's reluctant at first but after seeing how confident and 'a clown' Randy is, he decided to fight him since it's going to make him easy money. Much to his surprise, when he's beaten black and blue by Randy and lose the championship. The media ridicule him and turn him to a 'meme'. Seeing that, he insisted on a rematch so that he could regain his championship and dignity back but is denied. Heartbroken, he ditches his team and flies to LA. After training there, he returns and fight Nightmare but his head isnn't in the game and is beaten again. He altogether quit wrestling. He goes brooding, and sulking until he finally gets an opportunity to fight Randy again, well from there the ending is pretty clear.

This movie is an ultimate underdog story that we've already seen in plenty other movies. The execution is not given any special treatment here but it's quite straightforward and entertaining. I think the highlight of the movie is the build-up to the first match, what I like about it, is that they make it seems as if it's a real-life match with interviews and video call form various legends across both WWE ohhh AEW and MMA. The match itself is tense and quite thrilling. Sadly, after the first match everything slows down and the plot goes the predicable zone. I enjoyed the performances most especially Jonathan Good as Randy Stone, he's over-the-top and overconfident and is somewhat hilarious in the way that he behaves. Alex montagnani as the titular character is Ok, but not memorable. Gina Gersam is a scene stealer, I loved every scene that she's featured in. The rest of the supporting casts provide good support. The camera work is slick, I particularly like the POV shots that shows how Reiss is feeling during the fights. The soundtrack is good and adds more energy to the scenes.

On the whole, Cagefigher is an enjoyable flick, it may not be original in terms story but it's overly entertaining, and that's what matters usually in these type of flicks.