THE BOXER

In the boxing ring, sometimes your greatest opponent is yourself.  In a boxer’s life, sometimes their greatest fight to survive takes place outside the ring.  

Anastasia, a 27 year old female boxer, is gearing up for the biggest challenge of her boxing career – qualifying to compete at the Olympics.  Ana is a boxer by blood, her father Paddy,  and godfather RJ,  are both former boxers.  Along with her boyfriend Michael, they are her coaches.  With the loving support of her godmother, Margaret,  Ana’s biggest sources of strength are her family’s love and her faith in God.

Although things seem hopeful for Ana’s simple blue collar existence, she is in a constant struggle to fight the demons from her past.  As a young child, Ana and her father were abandoned by Ana’s mother, Eliza.  Forced to raise Ana as a single parent, Paddy did the best he could with the support of Ana’s Godparents.  For the most part, Ana seems to be coping well with her life.  That is, until she goes off to College and falls under the spell of a charming, handsome older man.  At first the experience is romantic, passionate and sex-filled; however, it doesn’t take long before her “Prince Charming” reveals his true self. During many drunken rages, he aggressively beats her and she does everything she can to survive.

After a few years, Ana finds it within herself to break free of the abusive relationship and manages to escape.  Utterly broken-spirited, she can’t bring herself to tell her family about the horrors she endured. She’s too embarrassed and too emotionally scarred to begin to face the ordeal she suffered.   Instead, she runs back into the loving, open arms of her family and straight into the boxing ring.  Life continues on as normal.  Ana and her new boyfriend, Michael, are both working at the local factory by day, making love by night.  And Ana is earning her accomplishments on the boxing circuit that are preparing her to qualify for the Olympics.  It all spirals out of control when her mother re-enters the picture and turns everyone’s world upside down.

Will Ana stay on track and make it to the Olympics and enjoy the success she’s been working so hard for?

Letting go of the painful past will allow her to hang on to the future… This is one woman’s  journey through a vicious cycle of abuse, recovery, survival, rejection and acceptance.

She is in a constant struggle through life… to do the right thing, be the right thing and, most of all, to accept her worth and believe in herself.

A feature film written, produced and directed by Kelly Carney