Bittersweet

It's hard to avoid clichéd descriptions like "knockout," but director Marieke Niestadt's documentary delivered a punch when it screened at the 2014 Macon Film Festival. The film follows Australian-born female boxer Diana Prazak as she trained with boxing champion Lucia Rijker for a high-profile match with Sweden's Frida Wallberg. Director Niestadt enjoyed uncommon access to the pugnacious Prazak and the chanting, Buddhist powerhouse Rijker as they prepped for the bout with Wallberg on her own turf in Stockholm. Nicely structured, with footage hopscotching between the central fight and the weeks leading up to it, "Bittersweet" is a surprising character study. It's about an outsider/underdog trying to prove herself against a blond stereotype -- a Swedish Barbie with gloves, if you will. And it grows almost unbearably suspenseful in its last half hour.