JoaoPovoaMarinheiro

We can always criticize Hollywood for bringing movies that are intended to toss some smoke to the viewer by presenting something new with repeated formulas and recycled plots we have seen somewhere else before. The same goes for "Southpaw"... apart from the fact that there's something more lying inside this story about a boxer's redemption. The answer to it is the trust it puts into the strength of its actors and the gripping emotions that come with it.

There's a little sparkle that starts to light up inside of us during the very first minutes of the movie. And even if we barely have the time to see Gyllenhaal and McAdams' characters, we didn't need more because we were instantly dragged towards an emotional charge that never abandons the plot and whose "legacy" is carried on the main actor's shoulders.

Gyllenhaal doesn't skip a beat and keeps his character's pain and rage constantly vivid in every detail - we feel it because we've somewhat experienced in our lives what it means to lose someone we love and feel lost afterward. We felt the struggle coming after the loss of a bond as strong as that one. That's why his performance is relentless and immaculate.

Truth is that the genuine side of "Southpaw"'s plot is based on the main character's fall and his irreproachable route to stand up again, reach the top once more. Only this time, the fight has completely changed and the goals are different, goals that make us question what we really fight for in our life.

You already know this story but not told under these terms. Hollywood has crafted good flicks about fighters/boxers in the last few years and "Southpaw" follows a line that is close to the more recent "Warrior", starring Joel Edgerton and Tom Hardy due to its "underdog" screenplay. What makes this movie different from the rest is the ineluctable emotion that never departs and befalls us, stirring and stirring our inner feelings.

We don't always need to criticize a movie for its predictability. "Southpaw" is predictable but it's also honest in assuming itself as such because its purpose - and I believe, Antoine Fuqua's purpose - is to divert our attention towards something more meaningful. And when a movie pierces the bone to reach our heart and soul with this impact, then it deserves our respect and acknowledgment.

"Southpaw" is, quite simply, liberating.

After making us laugh with the unconventional romantic comedy 'Crazy, Stupid, Love', the Ficarra/Requa pair switch the tape to a comedy-crime flick that keeps their game up as well.

It's your typical love story in not so typical romantic standards, as two thieves played by Will Smith and Margot Robbie fall in love after the first one teaches the latter how to make a criminal living.

The story has some very interesting twists that you didn't see coming and Will Smith fuels this big time as the cool and smooth Nicky.

'Focus' never stops pumping. It's pure entertainment with pace, rhythm and flair. Somewhere between Guy Ritchie's 'Snatch' and Matthew Vaughn's 'Layer Cake', less violent, sarcastic or crude. And with a touch of some Hollywood love.

Oh, and did I mention it features Margot Robbie?

Maybe it's fair to say that Blake Lively steals the show. Not just only for her natural beauty that fits the role for reminding us of cinema's most iconic blonde actresses. No. She drives the movie forward with elegance and wit, just as a lead actress should do.

It's a strange tale this 'Age of Adaline'. Instead of a Benjamin Button aging backwards, we get a woman that stopped getting old - at least from the outside - for more than 50 years. And, afraid of becoming a 'curiosity', she never stops running away and changing her identity, leaving her daughter behind and putting love on the sidelines. Until she meets Ellis Jones (Michiel Huisman).

We know from the beginning of the movie we're being fooled by a plot that, when you think about it, seems ludicrous, narrowly shallow and sometimes bold. But we buy it and the secret is that it's purely, almost innocently, charming.

Moreover, having Harrison Ford's contribution of an old man still heart broken because of that 'one girl who got away', is a genuine performance which also makes this worth watching.

Your mind will make you skeptical to the plot line but your eyes won't leave the screen. So hey, what can you do? Sometimes movies are about that too.