Champion Road

An ex-con's wife is diagnosed with cancer but her treatment will cost $30,000. He has to resort to the world of underworld street fighting in order to have a chance of making the money necessary to help his wife.

Champion Road is a real bargain basement movie. Its production values are rock bottom, with limited sets and a small cast of amateur actors. The storyline is very hackneyed and includes various clichés associated with this type of film – a man fighting for his family, an evil gangster fight promoter, an enigmatic trainer, a psychotic fighter who must be defeated, etc. It's a fight film but, bizarrely, all of the fights seem to happen when no one else is watching, yet it is said many people are betting on the outcome of them – go figure! Generally speaking, this not a good film in any way really. But somehow it's not a complete disaster either. It entertains to at least some extent. Given the ultra-low budget, I have to cut it at least some slack and say that it is an earnest enough effort. And given the serious lack of resources at its disposal it was less bad than several others I have seen with such minuscule budgets. Still, it would be impossible to describe this as a good film despite the honest endeavour behind it.