Sydney Sweeney delivers a knockout performance in Christy, a gut-wrenching portrayal of the famed boxer’s rise to stardom and the tragic price she paid after enduring years of domestic abuse. Christy Salas (née Martin) was cruelly exploited while breaking new ground in a sport where women weren’t taken seriously. She hid her sexual identity and sadly became part of a homophobic chorus deriding LGBTQ+ rights. Sweeney, nearly unrecognizable from her glamorous Hollywood stature, elevates the narrative through clunky time jumps and pacing issues, bringing the film to a whopper of a climax. You’ll shudder in horror as Christy faces her toughest challenge after an unforgivable and gruesome betrayal.
We first meet Sweeney’s Christy in the late ’80s, hooking up with her high school girlfriend Rosie (Jess Gabor). Their relationship was an open secret in the conservative coal mining town of Mullens, West Virginia. Joyce (Merritt Wever), Christy’s deeply religious mother, chastises her daughter for living in sin; she must embrace traditional values and find a good man or risk living in shame. Christy takes out her frustrations in local boxing matches for money. She’s untrained but tough as nails and packs a wallop.
Christy gets the attention of wealthy promoter and businessman Larry (Bill Kelly), who invites her to live and box in Tennessee under the tutelage of James Martin (Ben Foster). A married father and trainer, Jim has zero respect for women. The idea of a female boxer is anathema to everything he believes in. When Christy pulverizes one of Jim’s male fighters in a sparring match, that calculus changes; he begrudgingly accepts Christy and watches her make mincemeat of the local competition.
Christy’s burgeoning success in the ring begins Jim’s strangehold on her life. Now lovers, Jim convinces Christy to train in Daytona Beach, Florida, where she becomes the sole provider while continuing to dominate women’s boxing. Christy falls further under Jim’s iron grip with his alluring promise to introduce her to boxing titan Don King (Chad L. Coleman).
Director and co-writer David Michôd (Animal Kingdom, War Machine) proves Sweeney’s boxing mettle early. Her physical transformation and short-cropped black hair achieve Christy’s look, but the audience needs a clearer distinction between Sweeney’s A-list persona and her role as a boxing badass. Christy trains continuously throughout the film, going on runs to clear her head and get time alone from Jim’s control. These quieter scenes work because they depict Christy’s considerable efforts to stay in shape and remain razor-sharp. They also emphasize her commitment to her craft and Christy’s knowledge that innate toughness won’t help her against skilled opponents.
Sweeney is a hurricane of whoop-ass in the first act’s matches. She rains ferocious blows while taking every hit like a brick wall. Boxing then becomes secondary as her troubled marriage of convenience to Jim takes center stage. This change of focus turns her prizefights into a barrage of montages that undercut their cinematic punch. Michôd makes an uncharacteristic mistake by not properly depicting Christy’s championship form; her determination and drive takes a backseat to sensationalism as Christy and Jim’s media circus antics rise to the forefront in stylized recreations of their press interviews. This serves a needed purpose, but feels overblown in the greater context. Michôd hammers the point instead of taking a subtler approach, making Christy’s denouncement of queer boxers under pressure from Jim and her judgmental mother feel redundant.
Foster joins Sweeney in awards contention with a truly despicable supporting performance. The schlubby and balding Jim manipulates Christy at every turn. Their significant age gap endeared him to her mother, allowing Jim to whisk Christy away from her family and establish an unwavering dominance over the most minuscule details of her life. She couldn’t talk on the phone, choose her own meals or have any financial input at the height of her fame. An outwardly spirited and tenaciously tough woman became a depressed drug addict subservient to Jim’s degrading whims.
Michôd is brutal and unsparing in Christy’s darkest moment – it’s also where Sweeney shines the brightest, with an unflinching display of perseverance. Her literal fight for survival is a testament to courage, strength and willpower, but that’s just the beginning of Christy’s journey to reclaim her life and find her own footing. The most heartbreaking scenes see Christy challenging her mother’s lack of support and her use of shame as a weapon. The person who should have been her biggest advocate and protector enabled a vile abuser’s years of subjugation. But Sweeney exudes hope as Christy claws back from the brink and finally accepts herself as a queer woman.
There are occasional lulls as Michôd eschews a tighter edit for boxing theatrics and salacious details. Christy does run long at two hours and 15 minutes, but Sweeney always has the audience rooting for her. She’s gutsy and impressively physical in her most challenging role to date, giving Sweeney a legitimate shot at Oscar glory.
Christy hits theaters on November 7.
- Release Date
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November 7, 2025
- Runtime
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135 minutes
- Director
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David Michôd
- Producers
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Brent Stiefel, Kerry Kohansky-Roberts, Sydney Sweeney, Teddy Schwarzman, John Friedberg, Michael Heimler, Justin Lothrop, Brad Zimmerman, David Levine
