By James Slater – With “The Fighter” movie based on the life of the legendarily-tough “Irish” Micky Ward currently enjoying rave reviews and healthy box office returns, there appears to be another boxing movie in the works. Proving that boxing will always be an interesting subject to film makers, a movie about the life of the great Roberto Duran is in the pre-production stage, with a release date targeted for 2012.
To be titled “Hands Of Stone,” the film will reportedly star Gael Garcia Bernal as Roberto Duran, and veteran movie legend Al Pacino as Duran’s trainer and corner-man Ray Arcel. According to various reports, the film will in large part focus on the Panamanian star’s fights with “Sugar” Ray Leonard, the second fight especially..
According to hype surrounding the movie, fans will be given the “inside story” of what really happened on that unforgettable November night in New Orleans in 1980. Ever since that fight, where Duran, in the 8th-round, inexplicably waved his arm in the air and quit in the ring against the man he had beaten five months earlier, fans the world over have debated as to why Duran did what he did.
Arcel, who Pacino will play (in his first ever boxing film), was as shocked and as stunned as anybody. Utterly unable to accept the fact that his fearless, combat-loving warrior had chosen to take the easy way out, Arcel was never the same guy again post-Louisiana. Duran, of course, went home to find insulting graffiti plastered all over his house in Panama. A one-time hero had truly fallen from grace.
To this day the theories of why Duran did what he did abound: some say he was simply humiliated by the taunting, hands low tactics Sugar Ray sensationally decided to try, others still claim stomach cramps brought on by Roberto’s draining efforts at making weight caused him to quit. Hollywood may seem an odd place to look for the truth, but maybe the upcoming film will finally answer most if not all of the questions surrounding the whole “No Mas” episode.
In the tagline for the movie we read the following: “The infamous ‘No Mas’ fight is the biggest enigma in the history of boxing. This movie will answer that enigma.”
That boast is sure to see to it that filmgoers in general and boxing fans in particular go into theatres with an incredibly high sense of expectation. Let us hope the ambitious project delivers as promised!
“Hands Of Stone” will be written, produced and directed by Jonathan Jakubowicz.