A mixed-martial arts film from David Mamet? How on Earth is this going to pan out? No fear. This turns out to be Mamet's standard model, just deceptively transposed into an unexpected setting. There are backstabbing twists, a prevalent sense of fatalism and that trademark mannered dialogue style where all characters repeat themselves like a mantra (see Homicide, in particular). Oh, and Joe Mantegna.
Chiwetel Ejiofor, as the honour-bound jujitsu instructor who gets suckered into the corrupt world of MMA tournaments, makes a decent fist of dragging the script through its hokey philosophising and improbable turns with his understated gravitas, and there is a neat moment when the realisation dawns that while we're still watching a run-up to a final showdown, it's not with a man-mountain opponent but rather with the money-skewed American legal system. Sadly, Mamet seems to lose sight of this by the end.
5/10
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