Halle Berry And UFC Champion Valentina Schevchenko Star In MMA Movie ‘Bruised’

Halle Berry was seen at the weigh-ins prior to UFC 268 in New York City. Later that weekend she was seen strapping the belt on defending Strawweight Champion Rose Namajunas. This led many to wonder why Berry was at these events. It turns out she was there to promote her film, Bruised, which will be her directorial debut. Berry will also star in the film which will be exclusively on Netflix starting on Wednesday November 24th.

In the film Berry will play Jackie Justice, an aging former MMA fighter who stepped away from the fight game and the UFC to pursue other things. Justice who now has reunited with her son that she gave up for adoption at birth sees fighting as her only option to provide for her son. So Justice decides to take up fighting again, first in unsanctioned street fights, but then in Invicta the real life all female promotion.

In the film Berry stars alongside real life UFC Champion, Valentina Schevchenko who plays fellow MMA fighter, Lady Killer. It should be known that this will be Schevchenko’s acting debut. Berry said this  of costaring with Schevchenko in an interview with Jimmy Fallon “In this movie, I was fighting the real UFC flyweight champion, Valentina Shevchenko. And you know what? She had to throw some real kicks, and I had to really take them, and that really broke some bones.”  

Berry had high praise for Schevchenko’s ability to make her fight seem real “She’s a beast, but I couldn’t have asked for a better teacher, a better scene mate, a better fight partner. She just brought so much reality to it for me. At times, I felt like I was really fighting. Like, our referee that was in the movie is a real referee, and he says a couple times, ‘Man, I thought I was watching a real fight’ because she brought so much power and authenticity to our fight scenes.”

It should be noted the production of the film did cause a shake up in the MMA world. Cat Zingano was supposed to star in the film, and even took some time away from the UFC to star in the film, this time away from the UFC allegedly caused Zingano to get cut from the promotion. At the time Zingano was on a four fight skid which would cause most fighters to be cut from the promotion anyway. Zingano then ended up signing with Bellator. After Zingano got cut from the UFC Berry would not let Zingano act in the film because she was not a star in the biggest MMA promotion in the world. Zingano and Berry are fighting legally now.

We will be reviewing the film once it hits NETFLIX on the 24th of November. Till then watch the trailer below.