Christian Bale Gets in the Ring with Mark Wahlberg

This project will have on screen tantrums to burn: Christian Bale and flammable director David O. Russell will join Mark Wahlberg in The Fighter. Variety reports that Wahlberg will play former lightweight boxer "Irish" Mickey Ward and his brother Dicky Eklund, who would be portrayed by Batman. Eklund sure has led a life. As a boxer, he fought Sugar Ray Leonard and took him the distance, but eventually drugs and crime took over Eklund's life. He kicked the habits during a long run in prison, emerging from the gray bar hotel to train his younger brother for glory.Depending on the arc of Eklund's story in the film, it could be another one of those roles that allows Bales to go to extremes, although nothing like The Machinist, I'd wager. Russell's an interesting choice, and if he's on good behavior this has a lot of potential. He's worked with Wahlberg in Three Kings and I Heart Huckabees, but he has also had some serious flame-outs on set, most famously wih George Clooney. However, he's a really good director who never does things in a predictable way. He might be too much of a director for the script, but if you're a fan, it's got to be good news that he's working on a major production again.

Comments

[knives]

Wasn't Damon and Aronofsky attached to this at one point?

[Get The Big Picture]

They were, but I don't know if they were on it at the same time. Probably were. Also curious, Wahlberg and Bale are both looking at The Prisoners, which is a super hot script at the moment.