Born a Champion

The script is so ambitious that it never settles on a single theme for more than a few minutes. Equal parts sports drama, MMA, romance, inspirational, motivational, and yesterday's lunch. Strangely it is precisely this lack of traditional story-telling -- an anti-Rocky if you like -- that keeps it interesting. Flanery, softspoken and sincere, is perfectly suited to ground the effort, and Alex Ranarivelo has the solid skills needed to keep things moving. The audience never gets quite what it expects -- the ending makes that more than clear -- and therein lies its charm.

This is very low budget and the writing and story have some craft issues. That said, if you can get to the core of the fight scenes and story you'll find some unique moments. The main actor is the best he's ever been and really showed the beauty of jiu jitsu. This is as much a rocky comeback story as it is an homage to the power of jiu jitsu. Now, imagine getting this main actor a top notch script, budget and director? I would pay to see that.

Not having heard anything about this movie, I expected a straight-to-video type martial arts film based on BJJ - considering there seems to be a few cash grabs out at the moment. I figured it would be half way decent because Sean Patrick Flanery is a solid actor. What I didn't expect was a damn good story with great performances all around. I was also surprised to learn that Sean is a legit BJJ black belt, which is obvious as soon as he gets on the mat. Seeing this movie more than makes up for having to sit through the last 5 bad ones.

It is truly a love letter to jiu-jitsu, passionately crafted by people with genuine love (and possibly obsession, but not in a geeky way) for the martial art. As such, expect a total package that represents said love and/or obsession. Everything is beautiful and above standard.

So i didn't knew what to watch and had a look at new movies, i always enjoy Martial Arts movies, and i saw this, i was like alright ill give it a try. I am not Brazilian Jiu Jitsu's biggest fan as a Martial Arts in general, i mean i know its very effective but its not the best one to watch either on TV (UFC) or in movies, i prefer more flashy stuff like Muay Thai, Kickboxing, Wushu or Kung Fu. Yet this movie blew me away.

The fights are very well done and they never bore you, main actor being an actual BJJ Black Belt, but they are not the main point of the movie, what really hook me is the story. This movie is filmed as if it was a true story (wich i don't think it is at all) and you really get into it, you feel for the main character and you actually wish this was a real story.

Its really one of these movies that if the story wouldn't had been good, i would had probably negatively review it, because there is not a lot of fight, its more of a drama WITH fights in it. Kinda like what Rocky is to Boxing if i can say, altough there is a little more fights than the first couple Rocky movies. But since its well written and you do care for these characters and what happen to them, you really get into it. At least for me that was.

Honestly if you remotely enjoy BJJ, absolutely watch it, if you enjoy Martial Arts, give it a shot too. Its only like 10$ Canadian on Xbox Marketplace and it has French audio too. Not that it matter for most of you but well ;)