Jessica Hynes’ directorial debut began with a Boxfit class in her hometown of Folkestone.
It was held in “a lovely old Victorian building with beautiful red brick walls and a little boxing ring in the corner,” says the actress. “It was such an incredibly magical, cinematic space: the light was perfect, the colours great. And I thought, ‘I’d love to film in here.’”
As she punched and kicked, she realised something else.
“It struck me that all the women were there for a reason: we all wanted to smash a punch bag for something. I thought about a woman who was battling the things we all battle with, and overcoming them through amateur boxing.”
And so, after a couple of decades on screen and stage, Hynes, 46, finally started writing The Fight, her first feature film.
The idea evolved into a “female Rocky” of sorts – “borrowing from that genre but making it very real and relatable, set in this little seaside town where I live.”
Hynes stars as nurse Tina Bell, whose life with her partner is under strain as they both try to juggle full-time jobs and three children, one of whom is being bullied at school. After stumbling into a women’s boxing training session one day, Tina dons her leather mitts, and as she sweats out her frustrations, soon finds herself battling her inner demons too.
Having made her name in the late 90s as co-writer and star of the seminal sitcom Spaced opposite Simon Pegg, Hynes had long wanted to direct her own film: “I can’t lie, I had been given opportunities early on, after Spaced,” she recalls. “But I’d failed to make the most of them when the babies were small. I’d kind of accepted that I’d missed that boat.”
The multi-tasking myth
Hynes has three children and thinks the concept of women being born multi-taskers is something of a fallacy: “I am living proof that that is not true across the board,” she tells me.
“I like to do one thing extremely well. Film-making is very much about absolute focus and getting yourself lost in that task. Could I be intensively mothering and directing? It was a physical and metaphysical impossibility. You always have to make a sacrifice. You make a call. Then you live with it.”
She was thrilled to discover how much she loved, and had an aptitude for, directing: “The creative intensity of that experience was just what I was looking for. I really felt there was nothing that I couldn’t overcome, from pre-production, to shooting, to post-production. I really thrive in pressure situations – but I probably was quite hot-headed when I was younger. Now I’m much more of a methodical problem solver.”
Hynes had complete creative control from start to finish, something that comes across on screen: “Someone pointed out it was interesting watching a female boxing film made by a woman because I’m so unsexualised in it. I don’t look attractive at all,” says Hynes.
“Obviously for me that was great – I didn’t really wear any make-up and my hair was always just a straggly mess. The only struggle the make-up department did have was when I landed a real black eye in the ring…”
“How women are represented obviously is greatly affected by who represents them. I’m not saying male directors aren’t capable of it but I think naturally there is a difference.”
Breaking the taboos
Although launching a female-led film was not necessarily a conscious decision in the light of shifts in the industry – she had her own #MeToo story of being thrown off a movie by Harvey Weinstein for refusing to screentest in a bikini at 19 – she does feel “lucky to be a tiny part of that”.
“There are no generalities about female films or their success any more – all of those taboos have been broken. Look at Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman smashing the box office, all these fantastic greats absolutely rocking it. That filters down and allows female creatives space and opportunities to make their work. In the end that’s really what it’s about: it’s not about taking over the world, it’s not about dominating. It’s just about being in a society which values all equally and allows people to be as they are.”
She wanted there to be “real actual boxing” in the film, rather than “film boxing”. “I wanted to look like a normal-bodied, ordinary mum in a boxing ring who is actually getting punched in the head – sometimes a little bit too hard.
I think I may have had more of a passion to represent that than a man might.”
She admits watching herself back was less of a pleasant experience: “Editing yourself is horrendous.
I just kept saying to the editor, ‘Jesus Christ, she’s awful, can we cut that bit?’”
Fighting talk
Shaun Parkes plays Tina’s husband Mick, while Anita Dobson and Christopher Fairbanks play her parents and Sally Phillips, Alice Lowe and Russell Brand have supporting roles.
The carefully created soundtrack, designed with the help of Luke Abbott, includes Laura Marling’s 2012 track “Devil’s Spoke”: “I reached out to her and told her why I loved her music, how I’d I listened to this song obsessively at a time when I was trying to move through something and it had pulled me through. Almost instantly she texted me back and said, ‘of course!’” The whole experience was really thrilling.”
The film is a story of triumph over adversity, albeit firmly anchored in the everyday and the specificities of small-town life on the English coast: “It’s perhaps crass but the symbolism is: she’s in the ring, she’s fighting. It doesn’t matter, win or lose. That’s what we all need to feel in life, whether on an emotional or physical level, that we’re in the ring of our lives. Particularly these days, there’s no time, no space for weakness.”
For all the film’s drama, sourced in familial dysfunction, suppressed anger and childhood trauma, there’s a warmth at its heart, as well as a strong deadpan wit: “I’m definitely drawn to humour. I’m naturally trying to spot it in any situation,” Hynes says.
While evidently having thrived in the driving seat, Hynes admits it’s, “a responsibility too. Because of course, if it’s rubbish, then it’s your fault.”
Is she anxious about the reaction?
“I’m ready for anything. There are people who will find fault, there are people who will be drawn to it and find inspiration. I welcome all of it.”
Hynes defers to one of the great female boxers she discovered in her research, Ann Wolfe, to capture the sentiment: “She says being a true fighter means you’re not afraid to fail. You can’t do anything if you’re worried about losing. That’s the spirit in which I made this film.”
The Fight is in UK cinemas now
