Resurrecting the Champ (PG-13, 2007)

In RESURRECTING THE CHAMP, Erik (Josh Hartnett) -- a staff writer for the Denver Times -- wants to be a sports reporter. But he lives in the long shadow of his father, a much-admired and now-dead sports journalist. He's convinced that others don't see his talent: His estranged wife Joyce (Kathryn Morris) is a successful columnist at the paper, and his editor, Metz (Alan Alda), tells him that his copy is unimpressive ("a lot of typing but not much writing"). Moreover, his young son, Teddy (Dakota Goya), hopes that someday his daddy will introduce him to his famous friends, like Shaq or John Elway (who appears as himself, briefly). Unfortunately, Erik has stretched that truth a bit: He doesn't actually know the former Broncos quarterback. Erik sees a chance to make it all work out when he meets the Champ (Samuel L. Jackson), a beaten-down former boxer who's now living on the street and regularly getting beaten up by local kids. Erik buys him a beer and proposes to tell the Champ's story for the Times magazine.

"A writer, like a boxer," Erik says early on, "must stand alone. Having your work published, like fighting in a ring, puts your talent on display ... Sometimes the results can be disastrous." This not only sets up a disaster in the plot but also establishes Erik's notion that he has talent -- at least temporarily. These themes will be familiar to viewers of writer-director Rod Lurie's other films, like The Contender, which was set in the world of Washington, D.C. politics.

Interesting issues, but Resurrecting the Champ tends to reduce complex answers to simple-seeming melodrama. (It doesn't help that Hartnett isn't a terribly convincing performer.) Erik is in a gnarly business, where stories and truth aren't always different: "The one thing people don't want is the truth," explains Metz by way of a lecture. Because truth is too ambiguous, they want heroic tales or tragedies, moral lessons and judgments. The problem is, this movie uses the Champ's complications to get at Erik's simplicity.