Kali Reis in Catch the Fair One (IFC Films)

It is customary, and frequently compelling, in many mysteries that the deeper detectives investigate, the more disturbing the reality they uncover. Such mysteries find them discovering as much about themselves as whatever truth they are trying to discover, and often give viewers the feeling that it might have been better not to have looked at all.

Kaylee (Kali Reiss) is not a detective per se. She’s a boxer who, though she trains regularly, hasn’t been seen much in the ring of late. She hasn’t been the same since her younger sister disappeared, and though her friends try to convince her to give it a rest, she is determined to find her. She and her sister are both of Native American and Cape Verdean heritage and live in an area where disappearances of young Native women regularly occur, and the aura of dejection and resignation is overpowering. We see it in the town’s depressed populace, whether they are in public places or in the privacy of a support group for the grief stricken. Most of all, we experience it in the film’s tone and music. Kaylee, however, does not give up so easily. When she discovers that her sister may have been abducted by a sex-trafficking ring, she is willing to degrade herself and risk extreme danger, with very little planned, to get her back.

Catch the Fair One, at least in its aspirations, fits squarely into the school of mystery listed above, and it has lots of potential. Kaylee (nicknamed KO) is an unlikely, uncommon heroine, and the world she is forced to navigate is one rife with a quintessentially American sort of political corruption. Director Josef Kubota Wladyka admirably captures boxing and action sequences with extra focus on the bodies and faces of the fighters, giving the film an appealing and visceral immediacy. Unfortunately, the script is thinly conceived. Dialogue often verges on the rote and clichéd. People (villains especially) drift in and out of the action without more than the bare minimum of characterization, and the action lingers too long in violent, power-play scenes, with Kaylee and the villains taking turns as to who is humiliating whom. This is fine in and of itself, but the script does not sufficiently explore the context to give such events their proper weight. It is the rare film that does not benefit from its short running time (85 minutes). One has the sense that a longer movie would have given these characters, and this situation, more space to breathe.

Whatever flaws the script has, Reiss, a professional boxer, is a strong actor. She believably contains a stew of rage and anger, and collects it in her wary, intimidating gaze. She carries much more than the script gives her.