After her breakthrough with the HBO series “Euphoria”, Sydney Sweeney landed her first massive cinema hit with the glossy rom-com “Where the Lie Falls” – and already reported in interviews about her absolute passion project, a biopic about the professional boxer Christy Martin. That's why it's not surprising that the “The Housemaid” star not only plays the title role in the sports drama “Christy” by “The King” director David Michôd, but is also jointly responsible for the financing and realization of the project through her production company Fifty-Fifty Films. For the part, the actress, who is only 161 centimeters tall, gained almost 15 kilos in weight – most of which was muscle mass.
Sweeney, who was hardly recognizable compared to her other appearances, also refused to allow herself to be doubled during the filmed boxing matches – instead, she endured a lot of bumps, cuts and bruises over the course of the six-week filming. However, these ordeals did not pay off at the box office. The film opened in the US in November 2025 on more than 2,000 screens, but grossed just a pitiful $2 million – just over a tenth of its budget.
“Christy” is a huge flop, but that doesn't mean it's a complete failure. Even if the film has tonal weaknesses and could have used a thematic tightening, the acting as well as its visual and technical aspects are consistently successful. If you like athlete biopics and/or want to find out more about the difficult career of an extraordinary woman, you should simply lower the expectations that Sweeney himself built up a little – then you can watch “Christy” without much pain.
Not only the portrayed Christy Martin, but also the main actress Sydney Sweeney had to take a beating!
1989 in a small town in West Virginia: Miner's daughter Christy Salters (Sydney Sweeney) is able to attend college thanks to a basketball scholarship. However, she has to keep her love affair with her fellow student Rosie (Jess Gabor) a secret from her parents Joyce (Merritt Wever) and John (Ethan Embry), who are very concerned about her reputation in the community. One day, on a whim and to make a few bucks, Christy enters a local boxing tournament – and despite having no experience in the ring, she wins easily. The organizer (Bill Kelly) is impressed by her effectiveness and sends her to trainer Jim Martin (Ben Foster), who initially refuses to work with a woman. Only when Christy knocks out a male sparring partner with one punch does he agree to take care of her.
In her first professional fights, Christy destroys her opponents, while Jim gains more and more control over her private life. She even ends up marrying her trainer. Meanwhile, well-known promoter Don King (Chad L. Coleman) molds Christy – now with the new last name Martin – into boxing's first female superstar. Jim is therefore extremely jealous and embezzles large parts of their fees. When his wife cautiously expresses the idea of hiring another trainer, he reacts aggressively – and when she tries to leave him, he finally begins to physically abuse her…
Pure will instead of clean technology
The back and forth between sports film and social, relationship and character drama is often bumpy. In addition, the weighting of the individual story elements is a problem: Christy Martin certainly opened many, if not all, doors for women in boxing almost single-handedly – which should be appropriately acknowledged in a biopic about her. Nevertheless, there are too many scenes with her in the ring, especially in the first half of the film, because they are too similar: no matter who the title heroine faces in the training hall – she beats them all mercilessly.
The fights are not badly staged. Thanks to the lively camera work by Germain McMicking (“Mortal Kombat”), we as viewers almost feel as if we were in the ring with the protagonist. Even boxing laymen will notice that Sweeney is anything but technically good. Experts might even tear their hair out when they see how unclean and inefficient the boxing is here. For example, their protection is hardly there – and half of the uncontrolled successive blows simply go nowhere. But that's not meant to be a criticism of the performance, on the contrary: just a glance shows that Christy Martin acted exactly like that and easily compensated for her weak technique with impressive will and physical power on this real match with Deirdre Gogarty.
In the ring, Christy Martin quickly celebrates one success after another!
The private drama and the search for her personal identity are a lot more interesting because they are more complex, but they are initially far too short compared to the portrayal of her rise as an athlete. The whole thing lacks the emotional punch that made the Oscar winner “Million Dollar Baby” so intense. The second half of “Christy” corrects some of this imbalance by showing us several credibly acted scenes beyond the gym – for example between Sweeney and Katy O’Brian (“Love Lies Bleeding”), who embodies Christy’s rival Lisa Holewyne. This is where the film, which often feels pretty sluggish during the opening hour, finally picks up speed.
Sydney Sweeney and Ben Foster (“Hell or High Water”), who is also almost unrecognizable with a huge paunch and a terrible combed-over hairstyle, do their best in their roles that are still not coherently formulated by the script. Foster has it a little easier because his character, like Christy's, is bigoted Merrit Wever The skillfully hateful mother can quickly be identified as the villain of the story. Christy's motives for accepting Jim's less than half-baked marriage proposal, however, are as difficult to understand as her almost immediate submissiveness to him. After all, Sweeney's commitment and courage in particular – both to take physical punishment and to wear truly scary wigs – ensure adequate entertainment from this point onwards.
Conclusion: “Christy” is one of the biggest box office flops of the US cinema year 2025, but at least Sydney Sweeney's commitment and courage – both to take physical punishment and to wear truly scary wigs – are on the credit side.