A new movie, "The Fighter" takes place in Lowell, Massachusetts.  It’s about the career of a boxer, Mickey Ward, and his matches in the early 90’s.  A key aspect of the movie is its creating a sense of place of where the characters lived.  Many exterior shots were filmed in Lowell, a small, hardscrabble city north of Boston.  The toughness of the locale reflects on and helps explain the characters’ tough behavior.


http://www.historicbridges.org/massachusetts/aiken/

To further aid the establishment of the scene, there are a few glimpses of the Aiken Street Bridge (Ouellette Bridge).   This is a beautiful, tough-looking lenticular truss crossing the Merrimack River.  The old truss was built in 1883.  The bridge has had plenty of scrapes in over a century of service.  It is a perfect visual accompaniment to a movie about boxers.