--- title: "Giant" year: 2026 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/giant" fi1m_id: "giant" imdb_id: "tt26452616" tmdb_id: 1078581 wikidata_id: "Q125613304" fi1m_score: 55 critics_score: 60 critics_reviews: 6 published: "2026-09-09" updated: "2026-10-06T10:36:20.017329+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Giant (2026) Directed by Rowan Athale · 1h 50m · Drama, History, Sport ## Identity Giant - **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/giant - **Type:** Film - **Fi1m ID:** giant - **IMDb ID:** tt26452616 - **TMDB ID:** 1078581 - **Wikidata ID:** Q125613304 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26452616/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/1078581, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q125613304 **Fi1m score: 55** · Critics 60 from 6 reviews *In a sentence:* Pierce Brosnan in a tracksuit steals a film named after somebody else > Rowan Athale’s biopic of Prince Naseem Hamed is really a film about his trainer, and Pierce Brosnan’s Brendan Ingle is the best thing in it. Around him the fights are short, the script is familiar and the boxer himself never quite comes into focus. ## Synopsis Sheffield, and a boxing gym run by Brendan Ingle (Pierce Brosnan), a trainer with strong views on footwork and a habit of taking in whoever walks through the door. One of them is Naseem Hamed (Amir El-Masry), small, quick and already certain of himself, who calls himself Prince and treats every fight as a show. The film follows the two of them from the gym to the professional ring, as the promoter Frank Warren (Toby Stephens) arrives with contracts and the money starts to change what the gym was for. Katherine Dow Blyton plays Ingle’s wife Alma; Arian Nik plays Hamed’s brother Riath. Written and directed by Rowan Athale, it runs 110 minutes and carries a 15 certificate. ## Review Rowan Athale writes and directs the story of Prince Naseem Hamed, the Sheffield boxer who called himself Prince and behaved as if the crowd had come to see the walk rather than the fight, and of Brendan Ingle, the trainer who took him in as a boy and stayed in his corner as the crowds grew. The title points at Hamed, or at the size of what he did. The film, though, is about Ingle. That choice explains both what works in it and what does not, and the result is a decent, likeable, rather ordinary 110 minutes with one performance we would happily watch again. The performance is Pierce Brosnan’s. He plays Ingle as a talker, a man who teaches footwork the way a priest teaches catechism, and he does it without the polish we usually get from him. His Ingle is patient with the boys, cheerful with their mothers, slow to anger, and when the anger comes Brosnan lets it arrive in the shoulders before it reaches the voice. Katherine Dow Blyton, as his wife Alma, gives him someone to be quiet with. Their kitchen scenes are the steadiest thing in the film. Amir El-Masry has the harder job and less to work with. He gets the swagger right, the chin up, the mouth going, the entrance staged as theatre before a punch is thrown, and in the early Sheffield stretch he is good company. But Athale’s script treats Hamed mostly as something that happens to Ingle. As the fame arrives, so does Toby Stephens as the promoter Frank Warren, in good coats and with a briefcase, and so does Arian Nik as Hamed’s brother Riath, and the boxer’s own wants are handed to other people to state on his behalf. We left knowing exactly what Ingle thought of Hamed and not much about what Hamed thought of anything. The fights are another matter. They are short, they are few, and more than one is over before we have settled into it. We sat forward for the first ring walk and were let down, each time, by how quickly the film wanted to be somewhere else. It is a boxing film that seems slightly embarrassed to be one. Larry Smith does his best work in the gym, where the light is low and the camera stays close to the bags and the bodies; in the arenas the money runs out and a crowd of thousands is heard rather than seen. Neil Athale’s score pushes hard under the training montages and is better when it stays out of the kitchen. And then, late on, there is a scene between the two men in a plain room, which we will not describe, where Brosnan barely moves and El-Masry cannot stop moving, and we were more moved than the previous ninety minutes had earned. It is the scene the film has been walking towards, and it shows that Athale can direct actors when he trusts them to hold a room without a cut. There is not enough of that trust elsewhere. The boxing biopic comes with fixed furniture: the discovery, the montage, the first belt, the fame that sours, the split, the reckoning. [*Raging Bull*](https://film.one/film/raging-bull) (1980) broke the furniture up; *The Fighter* (2010) moved it all into the family living room. *Giant* keeps every piece where it found it. Its one change, putting the trainer at the centre, is a good idea half done. A film that committed to it would have made Ingle the lead on the poster as well as in the story, and would have found something for Hamed to want beyond the next entrance. If you see it, see it for Brosnan, and see it at home, where the thin arenas matter less and the kitchen matters more. Do not go for the boxing. It runs 110 minutes and carries a 15. *Fi1m score 55, published 9 September 2026.* ## What the critics say With only four reviews in so far, the spread is wide. Most agree on the shape of the thing: a rags-to-riches boxing biopic that shifts its attention from Prince Naseem Hamed to his trainer Brendan Ingle, and most single out Pierce Brosnan’s Ingle and the two lead performances as its steadiest asset. The reservations cluster around that shift, with several critics finding Hamed’s own story underdeveloped, the boxing scenes truncated and the writing generic or confused, and one noting a visibly tight budget. The Telegraph dissents most strongly, praising the direction for avoiding sports-biopic clichés and finding real weight in the final act. ## Straight answers **Is Giant worth watching?** *Giant* is worth watching for Pierce Brosnan's performance as the trainer Brendan Ingle, and not for much else; we scored it 55. The fights are short and few, the script keeps every familiar piece of the boxing biopic in place, and Naseem Hamed himself never quite comes into focus. See it at home, and see it for Brosnan. **How long is Giant, and what is it rated?** *Giant* runs 1h 50m. It is a drama and history film. **Where can I watch Giant in the US?** *Giant* is available to rent from Amazon Prime Video from $5.00. Availability is checked daily; the links above go straight to each service. **How violent or frightening is Giant, and is it suitable for children?** *Giant* carries a 15 certificate in the UK, so it is not for children, though it is a drama about a boxer and his trainer rather than a frightening film. The ring violence is brief and the fights are over quickly; the certificate points to language and adult drama more than anything the squeamish need fear. **How does Giant compare to Raging Bull?** *Giant* is the gentler, more ordinary film, and [*Raging Bull*](https://film.one/film/raging-bull) is the better one by a distance. Scorsese's film is punishing and exact and makes its boxer frighteningly hard to dismiss; Athale's is a likeable film about a trainer in which the boxer stays out of reach. Choose *Giant* if you want Brosnan and a Sheffield kitchen, *Raging Bull* if you can take the discomfort. **What should I watch after Giant?** After *Giant*, try [*Fat City*](https://film.one/film/fat-city) (1972, Fi1m 73): John Huston’s small-hall boxers, where the gym is the whole world and nobody wins much. Then [*Raging Bull*](https://film.one/film/raging-bull) (1980, Fi1m 91): The fighter biopic that every later one is either copying or avoiding; and [*When We Were Kings*](https://film.one/film/when-we-were-kings) (1996, Fi1m 83): Ali in Zaire; the showman as subject, done with the real footage. ### Reviews we read (6) - **The Telegraph**, Tim Robey (4/5): The biopic succeeds as a rowdy portrait of Prince Naseem Hamed's rise and his fraught professional relationship with trainer Brendan Ingle, which the film frames as a Falstaff-Hal dynamic. It stands out for its emotional weight in the final act and lively direction that avoids standard sports-biopic clichés. [Read](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/2026/01/08/giant-boxing-naseem-hamed-pierce-brosnan/) - **Screen Daily** (70/100, inferred): The film is a by-the-book but unpretentious boxing biopic that shifts focus to celebrate trainer Brendan Ingle through Pierce Brosnan's charismatic performance rather than the expected hagiography of Naseem Hamed. [Read](https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/giant-review-pierce-brosnan-and-amir-el-masry-spar-in-unpretentious-boxing-biopic/5210061.article) - **Variety**, Murtada Elfadl (65/100, inferred): The film follows standard sports biopic conventions in charting boxer Naseem Hamed’s rise but centers its narrative on the long, complicated bond between the fighter and his coach Brendan Ingle. It works best when exploring the push-and-pull of pride, loyalty and ambition in that relationship, with strong work from Pierce Brosnan, though the script gives the title character less dramatic depth. [Read](https://variety.com/2025/film/reviews/giant-review-naseem-hamed-1236601628/) - **Financial Times**, Jonathan Romney (3/5): The film follows genre conventions in its rags-to-riches boxing story but shifts focus to the trainer Brendan Ingle as the true giant, played with charm by Pierce Brosnan. It is energetic and solid overall, though visibly constrained by budget in places. [Read](https://www.ft.com/content/a25a9dcd-73c1-4228-a6f4-3665cafc5719) - **Empire**, Amon Warmann (45/100, inferred): The biopic focuses on the relationship between boxer Prince Naseem Hamed and his trainer Brendan Ingle, but shifts emphasis too heavily toward the latter, leaving Hamed's story underdeveloped despite strong performances from both leads. Early energy and attention to the cultural context are undermined by one-sided nuance, truncated boxing scenes, and a sense that a more complex tale remains untold. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/giant/) - **Little White Lies**, Mike McCahill (3/2/1): This meandering and shoddily written boxing biopic forces the story through a generic Britfilm template and ends up confused and compromised, though the two lead performances provide some minor pleasures. [Read](https://lwlies.com/reviews/giant) ## Details - **Director:** Rowan Athale - **Director:** Rowan Athale - **Writer:** Rowan Athale - **Cinematography:** Larry Smith - **Music:** Neil Athale - **Producer:** Kevin Sampson, Mark Lane, Stuart Ford - **Cast:** Amir El-Masry as Prince Naseem 'Naz' Hamed; Pierce Brosnan as Brendan Ingle; Toby Stephens as Frank Warren; Katherine Dow Blyton as Alma Ingle; Asan N'Jie as Tom; Arian Nik as Riath Hamed; Austin Haynes as Trev; Isabelle Bonfrer as Eleasha - **Runtime:** 1h 50m - **Release (the US):** 22 May 2026 - **Genres:** Drama, History, Sport - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqg5PtgeNRc ## Where to watch in the US - Amazon Prime Video: rent $5.00, uhd - Amazon Prime Video: buy $5.00, uhd *Checked 2026-09-10.* Also available in: AT, AU, CA, DE, ES, FI, GB, IE, NO, SE, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *Fat City* (1972), Fi1m 73: John Huston’s small-hall boxers, where the gym is the whole world and nobody wins much. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/fat-city.md) - *Raging Bull* (1980), Fi1m 91: The fighter biopic that every later one is either copying or avoiding. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/raging-bull.md) - *When We Were Kings* (1996), Fi1m 83: Ali in Zaire; the showman as subject, done with the real footage. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/when-we-were-kings.md) - *The Fighter* (2010), Fi1m 79: A boxing film where the hardest fights are with the family in the corner. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-fighter.md) - *Journeyman* (2017): Paddy Considine’s British boxer after the last bell; quiet, painful and short. --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/giant