THE FIGHTER – david o. russell – 5.9 / 10

It’s all Martin Scorsese and Robert DeNiro’s fault.  I’m not positive that they originated it, but ever since they popularized it in Mean Streets, the good-for-nothing screw-up hoodlum sidekick has become an archetypal character in gritty movies about blue-collar guys from the wrong side of the tracks.  Johnny Boy, DeNiro’s character in Mean Streets, may not have been the first such character, but he was certainly the most indelible.  And ever since that movie, in any film centering around a group of male friends struggling to get or keep their lives on track, that character is bound to turn up.  Scorsese even went back to that well a couple times (with Joe Pesci’s characters in Goodfellas and Casino).