Review: Stirring boxing drama ‘The Fire Inside’ is gold-medal worthy

You can see the fire almost immediately.

Rachel Morrison’s stirring sports drama “The Fire Inside” mostly focuses on boxer Claressa Shields’ teenage years (in which she’s played by Ryan Destiny), but in a brief prologue, we meet Claressa at perhaps 10 years old (played by Jazmin Headley).

Watching her run determinedly through the streets of her weary neighborhood in Flint, Mich., we quickly learn everything we need to know about this child: She is strong and athletically gifted, she is uncannily focused, she has something to run from — and she’s looking for something to run toward.

That something is hiding at the local boxing gym, where the slow smile of volunteer coach Jason Crutchfield (Brian Tyree Henry) shows us that there’s something special in this fierce little girl.

Morrison, an Academy Award-nominated cinematographer whose credits include " Mudbound " and " Black Panther,” makes her feature directing debut here, and while it ticks all the expected boxes for a sports drama, it’s also something more.

Barry Jenkins’ script doesn’t simply take us to Claressa’s moment of glory at the 2012 London Olympics, where many movies might have stopped. It shows us what happened next: how Claressa returned to Flint to find that her life of struggle hadn’t really changed, how the world of sports marketing may not be welcoming to a young Black woman boxer (“It’s hard with sports people don’t like to see women in,” an agent explains), how she needed to find a way to tune out the noise outside.

There’s a lovely, quiet scene in her messy teenage bedroom, with yellow light from the window catching her face as she turns over her gold medal, its sparkle seeming to come from another world.

Newcomers to boxing will learn a few things (the sport’s Olympic trials, apparently, take place in a ballroom, with chandeliers and people sipping wine), but honestly you don’t need to love sports to be caught up in this movie.

Destiny is entirely believable both as a champion boxer (known as “T-Rex,” because of her short, powerful arms) and a young woman finding her way, and Henry has a moving, gentle toughness as the coach who couldn’t quite climb the heights himself, but helps her get there.

Their relationship is rocky and complex — he sees himself in her — but its arc is beautiful; their last scene, sitting quietly together on a sidewalk in the sunshine, is immensely satisfying. That fiery little girl has grown up, and found herself — and gold — along the way.

3.5 stars (out of 4)

Rating: PG-13 (for strong language, thematic elements and brief suggestive material)

How to watch: In theaters