Watch The Calcium Kid For Free
The Calcium Kid
When milkman Jimmy Connelly accidentally puts Britain's contender for the World title out of action, he is propelled from amateur boxer to the world stage and announced as the replacement contender for the championship fight.
Release : | 2004 |
Rating : | 5.5 |
Studio : | Universal Pictures, WT² Productions, StudioCanal, |
Crew : | Art Direction, Production Design, |
Cast : | Orlando Bloom Michael Peña Michael Lerner Billie Piper Omid Djalili |
Genre : | Comedy |
Watch Trailer
Cast List
Related Movies
Reviews
Simply A Masterpiece
Don't listen to the negative reviews
The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.
Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.
I only watched it because it was the only Orlando Bloom film on Netflix that I hadn't seen. I thought it was really funny, and I laughed out loud quite a few times. The casting was fantastic, and Orlando Bloom was hilarious! It's good to know that he can act in something other than an action film. I also felt that the film succeeded in the mockumentary format, something which can be very tricky. This was a sweet and funny film that felt genuine, no overacting or overly ridiculous stunts. I was pleasantly surprised to see my favorite time traveling companion Rose Tyler. I have to say, I also found the film to be inspiring. I would definitely watch this film again!
Jimmy is a milkman who knocks the contender for the world championship belt out....So Herbie the boxing promoter decides that Jimmy is the next great one...And so Jimmy's journey to greatness begins, in this slapstick comedy.The film has its moments with some great lines from Omid Djalili, who takes on a more pivotal role in this film as the scheming and sometimes completely idiotic coach...While Bloom puts a good solid performance as the 'Happy-Go-Lucky' kid... I thought the end boxing match was a little odd..They could have had an actual fight scene... But all in all loved the documentary side to the film...Hilarious!
What the hell is the matter with this movie? Firstly, I've seen some bad Orlando Bloom films, but this one just takes the mick. His accent is simply terrible. The jokes in this film are pathetic. I wanted to cry at the embarrassment of this film. I just don't get how people think that it is even remotely good. After the first 10 minutes (which included Mr Bloom feeling himself up in his bed) I just couldn't stand much more. I don't see how anybody can sit through this movie, even if it does have a popular heart-throb (although horrendous actor) Orlando in it, it's just a very very badly made and badly acted film.Shame on you.
My sister managed to track down a Region 1 copy of "The Calcium Kid" for me on DVD.I thought it was a good little movie. It turned out to be MUCH better than I thought it would be; I figured it'd be a comedy and some good laughs, but it had some serious quality to it too, which was deftly executed by the writers, director, and the actors. Anyone who says Bloom isn't a good or even competent actor needs to watch this film, honestly; he lands on the scale talent-wise down below Johnny Depp, admittedly, but he's still as good or better than a lot of "stars" I see on the big screen. (Give me an actor any day of the week over a star, has always been my motto.I've always in the past liked actors hardly anyone knew.) The story is pretty simple (proving yet again, as I beat my head on my keyboard trying to come up with a good book idea, the best stories have the least bullshit to them). Jimmy Connelly is a milk deliveryman with a dairy. This guy loves milk not just in his job, but in his real life, and has imbibed so much over the course of his life that his bones are hard as granite.For exercise, Jimmy likes to spar in the boxing ring and answers an ad at a neighborhood gym to help English middleweight hopeful Pete Wright train for his upcoming match with Mexican-American middleweight world champ Jose Mendez in London. Wright breaks the bones in his hand on Jimmy's head and Pete's manager, Herbie Bush, is forced to find someone to step into the ring in only 7 days for the heavily-televised match. He picks Jimmy, who has no sports career, and the press quickly picks up on the new kid in the "David and Goliath" vein of storytelling.Without giving too much away, I'll just say Jimmy encounters obstacles along the way, both humorous and poignantly sad. He starts the movie as a wide-eyed, cheerfully simple fellow and ends it pretty much the same way, but does grow as a character. There are several points where Bloom's expressive facial features - eyes, mouth, eyebrows - tell a lot more than even what Jimmy is saying, and it seems he takes direction very well from whomever is behind the camera. Jimmy's no brain trust, but when push comes to shove, he's smarter than he looks, at least in common sense.The movie is filmed "mockumentary" style - the "director" is setting out to document Pete Wright's training a week before the match, as well as his daily life and background, but switches to Jimmy's story once he steps into Pete's place. The use of cutaway shots and still frames is a bit odd at first, but you get used to them, and it works; ditto with the soundtrack choices.There were several supporting characters I liked a lot, in addition to Jimmy. His manager, Herbie Bush (forgive me, I don't have all the actors' names in front of me as I write, so I'm going to refer to the character names), is a guy looking to make a buck any way he can, and usually comes off as strictly an opportunist lout. He's not really a bad guy, though - he thinks fast on his feet and talks too much, but his schemes just don't usually work out the way he envisions.Probably the characters I'll remember the most, though, are the crazy neighbor girl, Margaret, and Jimmy's pal Stan. Margaret reminds me of those celebrity stalkers you read about, who just adores Jimmy. She is not, however, the woman you want to see him with at the end of the day. Stan is a comfortably slovenly overweight fellow who sticks by Jimmy when things go bad, and ends up helping him train in odd ways. Another character I liked was Paddy, Jimmy's trainer, who keeps calling him the wrong name, LOL. ("You mad old Irish bastard! My name's NOT Johnny! It's Jimmy!")All in all, I will definitely watch it again. I get excited by good storytelling, as a writer, because it inspires me in small ways.