Watched this movie on my flight from Paris to the USA earlier today (or yesterday?). Not a great boxing movie, but it does capture elements of the Irish (or could just as easily be Italian) blue-collar world of New England.
The movie is set in Lowell, MA, a rough working-class town outside of Boston. My olde New England contains a disappearing old Yankee breed, a disappearing semi-old multi-ethnic farming contingent (especially Poles from the later 1800s), and, in urban and semi-urban areas, large Irish and Italian-origin populations which stick to many of their old ways. Increasing numbers of Mexicans are appearing, too - some in the illegal drug biz and the better ones are masons or in the army of unskilled laborers.