Rating: 
Summary: Raging Baloney
Review: "Against the Ropes" is not merely the title of Meg Ryan's latest movie; that phrase must also describe how she feels these days, as she tries in vain to persuade her fanbase that she's more than just a cuddly blonde romantic comedy lead. Although she bared her body and her soul in director Jane Campion's seamy "In the Cut," audiences weren't interested, and it doesn't look likely that "Ropes" -- opening nearly a full year after it was scheduled to premiere -- will give anyone much to cheer about. A heavy-duty fictionalization of the life story of Jackie Kallen, a former sportswriter and public relations specialist who hit it big as a boxing promoter, "Ropes" squanders rich source material, opting for cliches and stock situations instead. Worse still, screenwriter Cheryl Edwards has cooked up some real humdingers for Ryan's Jackie to deliver, such as "The world is not an oyster: It's a smelly tank, full of dirty water and sharks. It is not easy to swim." That Ryan manages to get past that line without bringing down the house is a credit to her skill, and she does have a few effective moments as Jackie, who speaks in a rough-edged voice and maneuvers through stadiums and sports bars with a self-satisfied swagger in her step. "Ropes" also offers conclusive proof that whatever Ryan is paying her personal trainer is money well-spent. She looks sleek and shapely in a series of clingy, peek-a-boo outfits designed to highlight her legs, her figure and her cleavage. Unfortunately, everything else in "Ropes" is considerably less impressive, from Omar Epps' wake-me-when-it's-over performance as Luther Shaw, the boxer Jackie pushes into the ring, to the unconvincingly conveyed atmosphere of downtown Cleveland, which features a slew of hard-boiled mugs who might have slithered out of "Guys and Dolls," as well as a few crack-crazed derelicts whose language and behavior remains within the boundaries of the PG-13 rating. Forget "Raging Bull" -- this is Raging Baloney. The movie's only real point of interest -- besides Ryan's imaginative wardrobe -- is its willingness to let Jackie look like an attention-starved fool when she finally begins to make a name for herself. Caught up in the fame game, she struts in front of HBO's cameras in a backless black leather gown and does her best to prove to everybody that she's her own biggest fan. The rest of "Ropes" is as clueless about what Rubin "Hurricane" Carter once called "the sweetest sport" as that old Barbra Streisand/Ryan O'Neal farce "The Main Event." And at least in that one, you eventually got to hear Barbra belt out the oh-so-disco theme song ("Extra! Extra! I'm in lo-ooo-ve!"); "Against the Ropes" offers no such payoff in its final round.
Rating: 
Summary: Loved this movie!
Review: ****
I really loved this movie. I read the other reviews (most of which were negative) and strongly disagree with them. I think Meg Ryan was wonderful, likewise Charles Dutton and the other actors. I am not a boxing fan. That doesn't matter. This movie is good entertainment. It is based on a true story of a female boxing manager who lets fame go to her head, makes some bad choices, and eventually...discovers what really matters. Men will love it (for the fight scenes, Meg Ryan, and the competition) and women will love it because it shows what women are capable of---anything---even in a man's world). Rent it or buy it---you won't be sorry. Great date movie.
****
Rating: 
Summary: only the audience is truly against the ropes
Review: *1/2 Though ostensibly based on a true story, "Against the Ropes" is pure movie hokum from start to finish.
Jackie Kallen made a name for herself as one of the few successful female managers in the history of professional boxing. In the movie's prologue, we meet Jackie as a young girl so obsessed with the sport that she spends her off hours at the gym helping her dad train her uncle, a fighter who died very early in his career. Years later, Jackie, on a dare, agrees to manage her own player - if only she can find a talent who will be willing to put his life and his career in the hands of an untried but determined woman. She alights on Luther Shaw, a drug-dealer-with-a-heart-of-gold whom she picks up in the nearby projects. Luther is, for the most part, a fictional character, a composite, we're told, of several of the fighters Kallen led to victory in the ring.
Regardless of how much of this is fiction or nonfiction, "Against the Ropes" fails to generate any heat either as a character study or as a human drama. We're supposed to find all this interesting simply because Kallen is an attractive woman trying to prove herself in a man's world. Yet, the story is hackneyed, the dialogue corny, the characters and their conflicts trite and underdeveloped. The Cheryl Edwards screenplay is so sketchy and poorly articulated that we often don't understand why characters are behaving the way they are, particularly when it comes to the rough-and-tumble relationship between Jackie and Luther. One moment they are getting along swimmingly, and the next Jackie is strutting around blowing her own horn while Luther sits pouting in the corner. Whole episodes, which could have gone a long way towards explaining the characters' motivations, seem to have been dropped from the finished product at the last minute.
Kallen is obviously a change-of-pace role for Meg Ryan who generally plays the innocent ingénue lead in romantic comedies. Yet, despite the fact that she is a trifle more serious here and even gets to work with an accent (the mark of any "serious" performer looking to buck up her credentials), the movie itself is so lacking in tension and grit and so determinedly upbeat and optimistic that it really doesn't give the actress a whole lot of opportunity to truly stretch those acting muscles. In fact, in the final scene, the film turns into little more than a vanity production for the waning star. Omar Epps fares a bit better, turning in a performance of strength and dignity, though the script lets him down by failing to develop his character to any appreciable extent.
The one fight scene is only moderately well executed and comes way too late in the film for anyone interested in the sport to still be hanging around ringside at that point. In fact, no one comes even close to scoring a knockout blow in "Against the Ropes" - not Ryan, not Epps and certainly not the audience. "Against the Ropes" is a sucker punch all the way.
Rating:
Summary: Great story, abrupt ending
Review: This movie is a great story of how to fight for what you believe in and that success does not come easy. Based loosely on the true story of Jackie Callen, Meg Ryan is wonderful as a woman trying to break into the boys-club of boxing management. She grew up loving boxing and knows the sport inside out. After being mistreated and underappreciated by the men she works for in sports, she goes out on her own with a young thug named Luther (the fine Omar Epps) whom she thinks has potential. With help from some old friends of her late uncle (himself a pro boxer), she turns Luther into a winner. Along the way, the attention goes to Jackie's head and she starts to alienate those around her, including her fighter who then wants out of his contract with her.
Charles S. Dutton directed and plays trainer Felix, Tony Shahloub is Jackie's main adversary and Tim Daly is a local TV reporter and her romantic interest. It is a great movie, but I think the ending is kind of abrupt, Luther wins the title fight everyone thought he wasn't ready for, then he and Jackie hug and make up...did he get out of his contract? Did she hook up with the reporter? Meanwhile, the real Jackie Callen was married with two sons when she started in the business and was from Detroit, not Cleveland. The screenwriter took quite a bit of poetic license. It is still a good movie though, a great mix of comedy and drama.
Rating:
Summary: A complete waste of time
Review: Awful, awful, awful.
Meg Ryan, whom I adore, was abhorrent. She was as out of place as a potted plant on Mercury.
The boxing sequences looked like they were choreographed by a kindergartner. If you have any familiarity with boxing whatsoever - for example, if you watched just one Mike Tyson fight - you probably could have done a better job.
No wonder this movie tanked at the box office - $5.88 million on a budget of $30 million.
What a pity that a story about a successful woman in a man's world couldn't have been put together better.
Rating:
Summary: RIveting and inspirational
Review: Grab this DVD as quickly as you can. Here's why:
1. It tells the true story of a woman, Jackie Kallen, who broke into the male-dominated boxing world. Very inspirational and Meg Ryan's performance is strong and solid.
2. There's an interview with the real Jackie Kallen and a behind the scenes look at how and why the movie was made.
3. The movie is gripping to watch and Kallen isn't portrayed as a stereotype or saint but as a very real (and flawed) person. In short, this isn't a "fluffy" movie but one that tries to be relatively honest (by Hollywood standards).
Very riveting, great fight scenes, strong perfromances - what more is there to say?
Rating: 
Summary: Okay
Review: It was a decent movie, but Meg Ryan could NOT do the accent; that was the one thing it was hard for me to get past. Omar did wonderful with his acting. Worth seeing.
Rating:
Summary: "Pretty tough can do anything"
Review: Jackie Kallen (Meg Ryan) is tired of her job and her boss, but is still taking it because she gets to be in contact with the world of boxing, which is her biggest passion. Her dad was the boxing coach of her uncle, so she spent a large amount of time close to the ring during her childhood and now she cannot stay away. She is almost miserable, but one day while being a little drunk at a party she gets in a discussion with La Rocca, one of the top boxing managers in the country, and he offers her one of his boxers for one dollar. Needless to say that she accepts the challenge.
Now her boss wants her to back out of the deal, but the media caught a whiff of the story and it's too late. On top of this, the boxer she is supposed to manage is an addict and is involved in dealing. But luck is on her side, and while being at her boxer's house she meets Luther in very special circumstances: he knocked out her boxer easily. Things are different now, because she has a real prospect and can truly test if she is any good in this business. As the film progresses though the question becomes: If Luther starts rising through the ranks, will the partners be able to keep their cool or will they go astray under the spell of fame and money?
This is your typical movie for an afternoon in which you want some light entertainment. The story is not extremely original as it has been explored various times before in boxing as well as in other sports. The new twist introduced in this case is the involvement of a female in a sport that seemed to have no place for them until a few years back. The performances, without being bad, are nothing to praise. I would sum it up by saying that this is a movie that you will probably enjoy, but will not either love nor look forward to watch a second time.
Rating: 
Summary: A lot better than expected!
Review: Okay, I heard that this movie wasn't so great, and like other Meg Ryan fans, I love to watch her in movies like "Sleepless In Seattle" and "You've Got Mail", but I think I was just really pleasantly surprised by this movie. Meg Ryan plays Jackie Kallen, a woman who's been around the sport of boxing all of her life. And only until years later after being pushed around and stepped all over, Jackie Kallen began her journey to gain the respect of the other men in the business. See, the top-dogs of boxing, the managers and all, say it's a "man's world", but Jackie Kallen proves otherwise, as she hires Luther: a strong fighter, but weak minded man from the projects. Jackie Kallen takes Luther in to be trained by a very good friend of hers, and slowly but surely, Luther begins to become a better boxer and Jackie will soon find herself absorbing all of the attention they're about to get and will be blind to see the fact that it's her fighter who's now being walked all over. You'll just have to see how things turn out. And guess what? It may not be a romantic comedy, but there were moments throughout this movie that had me crying! I was very surprised at everyones' performances. I think the acting was really good, and that this movie had very few flaws. I love Meg Ryan as an actress, and since I've liked every other movie she's in, I figured I'd give this one a shot. I'm glad I did, 'cause I plan on adding this onto my DVD collection! This movie proves that Meg Ryan is capable of pulling off any role. She doesn't have to be "America's Sweetheart", but really, I don't care. I'll watch any movie with her in it, because she is so good of an actress.
Rating:
Summary: Boxing was her passion
Review: One of the reasons I liked this movie was the message of you can do anything you set your mind to do regardless of the obstacles in the way. The movie starts off in 1972 with a little girl standing by the ring watching the boxers fight. You can see the fire in her eye, and as a little girl she really loved boxing. Fastward to adulthood and Jackie is an Executive Assistant to Irv Able. Boxing is her passion and working as an Executive Assistant is her way to be involved. A night out at a party she gets into a discussion with La Rocca (Tony Shaloub) and he offers her one of his boxers for a dollar. She is more than up for the challenge. Problem is the boxer is a major crackhead, and has smoked away all his money. He is in no condition to fight for anything except for finding a way to feed his sorry drug habit.
Enter Luther Shaw, a drug dealer by trade, but Jackie sees something in him that she can work with. Especially after Luther knocks out the boxer she was supposed to work with. Luther is tough, stubborn and he thinks he knows it all. Enter boxing trainer Felix Reynolds (Charles Dutton). Felix takes no mess and has no problem putting Luther in his place and bringing him down a notch. Hearing Meg Ryan say words like "off the hook" and "the bomb" in her accent was too funny too me. I know she was playing her role, but it just came out as forced and it just did not sound right. Omar Epps looked really good in his role. You can tell he buffed up to play this role, and his performance was a good one.
I also liked how Jackie was willing to help Luther secure a better place to live and how to manage his finances. When Luther thanks Jackie for helping him you could see that was hard for him to do, but you could also see his vulnerability, and could sense he really appreciated Jackie for looking out for him. Something he has not had happen for him in his life. I thought that was a touching scene.
Sammy mess with Luther's head convincing Luther that Jackie does not have his best interest in mind and that Jackie will have more of a career then he would. Jackie in fact has gotten beside herself. The attention is going to her head and Luther wants out of his contract with her.
Shaw has to fight contender Pedro Hernandez sooner then expected. In three weeks. Will he be ready? Will Luther Win or lose? Needless to say Shaw is a huge under dog. Jackie hands Luther over to La Rocca and realizes that was a huge mistake. Kallen gives him a pep talk that gives him a major boost during the fight. Jackie fades into the background, giving Luther the spotlight. One of the funny lines was Renee (Kerry Washington) who is Jackie's best friend in the film saying, "you call me for Black up" when Jackie goes into a rough neighborhood.
I feel the movie is worth seeing at least once. It's not a fantastic movie, but it kept my attention. The ending was rather abrupt. The movie left some unanswered questions. I really enjoyed Omar's and Dutton's performance in the film.
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