The Cut
Directed by: Sean Ellis
Written by: Justin Bull
Starring: Orlando Bloom, Catriona Balfe, John Turturro
Release Date: September 5, 2025
Rating: ★½ out of ★★★★☆
The Cut (2025), starring Orlando Bloom, Catriona Balfe, and John Turturro, is a brutal mash-up of boxing drama and horror torture. Does Sean Ellis’s sports-horror hybrid work, or does it collapse under its own weight? Read the full review.
A Boxing Movie That Turns Into a Horror Film
The Cut is one of the strangest sports movies I’ve ever seen. It begins as a boxing drama but morphs into something closer to torture-porn horror. That’s a unique mix of genres I haven’t encountered before, so I’ll give the film points for originality. Unfortunately, that’s just about the only positive point. The movie quickly devolves into a messy, sloppy, and punishing experience. Its brutality overwhelms whatever story Ellis and screenwriter Justin Bull were trying to tell.
Orlando Bloom as “The Boxer”
The film stars Orlando Bloom as a character known only as The Boxer, a former champion whose career ended in disgrace after a devastating cut forced him out of his final match. Four years later, he’s working as an assistant trainer and janitor in his wife Caitlin’s (Catriona Balfe) boxing gym in Ireland. Though his glory days are behind him, The Boxer still dreams of redemption, sneaking in late-night training sessions.
That chance comes with grim irony. When a fighter set for a Las Vegas title bout suddenly dies, the promoter needs a name replacement. He approaches The Boxer with a lucrative offer. The catch? The fight is just two weeks away, and The Boxer needs to shed nearly 30 pounds to make weight—a dangerous, possibly deadly prospect.
The Descent Into Punishment
Caitlin opposes the idea, but when The Boxer insists this is his shot at redemption, she relents—believing he won’t actually make the weight in time. Once they arrive in Las Vegas, however, things spiral into nightmare territory. The Boxer subjects himself to starvation, purging, and extreme dehydration, yet the results aren’t enough.
That’s when a new trainer enters the picture.
John Turturro’s Disturbing Mentor
John Turturro plays Boz, who at first seems like he could become a Mickey-style figure, a tough-love motivator to help The Boxer achieve the impossible. But instead of a Rocky-esque mentor, Boz veers closer to a Jigsaw-like tormentor. He pushes The Boxer onto illegal drugs and forces him through dangerous, torturous sweat sessions that nearly kill him.
What should have been gritty inspiration instead transforms into outright horror. Director Sean Ellis leans heavily on dizzying camerawork, kaleidoscope filters, and flashing lights in an attempt to place us inside The Boxer’s perspective. Instead, the result is nausea-inducing, more obnoxious than immersive. The film soon resembles Saw or Eli Roth’s Hostel more than a boxing drama.
Style Over Substance
The problem isn’t just the camera tricks—it’s the lack of story progression. For long stretches, nothing happens beyond Bloom’s character hallucinating, vomiting, or collapsing. Caitlin, the one character with emotional stakes and forward drive, is sidelined once Turturro appears, leaving us with empty spectacle.
Orlando Bloom deserves credit for his physical transformation and willingness to suffer for the role, but the character has no arc. Catriona Balfe brings warmth in limited screen time, but her story fades into the background. Even the film’s title feels underdeveloped—the “cut” that once ended The Boxer’s career has little connection to the rest of the movie.
Final Verdict
The Cut is billed as a boxing comeback story but instead plays like a punishing endurance test. What could have been a gritty tale of redemption becomes an exercise in excess. Sean Ellis’s stylistic flourishes cannot disguise the film’s lack of depth or momentum.
Despite strong performances from Orlando Bloom and Catriona Balfe, and a menacing turn from John Turturro, the film is hollow at its core. The Cut is original, yes, but originality without purpose only cuts so deep.
Rating: ★½ out of ★★★★☆
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