The Wrestler (***)

Directed by: Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain)
Starring: Mickey Rourke, Marisa Tomei, Evan Rachel Wood
Seen: February 22nd 2009

*** Out of ****

This movie is about so much more than Wrestling. It might as well have had running and been called The Runner. This film is about identity and livelihood. Mickey Rourke does a fantastic job as Randy “The Ram” Robinson, and his Academy Award nomination is well-deserved. It is, as is almost always the case with Aronofsky’s films, not always an easy movie to watch, but where Requiem for a Dream had us pitying the characters for their merciless perseverance to end themselves, here we are rooting for The Ram to be all he can be, he is a Wrestler through and through, and we learn to respect the fact.

We’ve always known that wrestling is a farce, and people always say wrestlers learn how to fall in just the right way, but it is still brutal stuff, as the film most definitely and bloodily shows us without being afraid or ashamed of it for even one second. Randy is a well-loved Wrestler, in front of the crowd, and with his younger peers, but he can’t take the punishment that well anymore, as he soon finds out after collapsing in the dressing room after a fight, only waking up in the hospital after bypass surgery.

Apart from his peers who are his friends, Randy realises that he is alone, and the viewer realises this with him in one especially touching scene. Randy goes to a legends of wrestling signing opportunity, and as he sees the guys around the room with him he notices a few small things: one guy falls asleep on the table; another has a walking stick handy; the next one yawns with not many teeth to show; one is in a wheelchair; and one has a urine bag tied around his ankle. Your heart breaks for him as you know he starts seeing himself as part of this older, forgotten group.

Acting on the advice of Cassidy (Tomei), a middle aged stripper in an almost similar place in her career, and a long-time love interest, Randy goes looking for his daughter Stephanie (Wood). The Father-Daughter dynamic is beautifully portrayed, with the initial aggressive hesitance, the gradual peacemaking, the beautiful moments they share, and the inevitable collapse all deeply touching. Trying to build a life outside of Wrestling is hard for Randy, and there are moments when he shines, but in his heart Randy is a Wrestler, and he believes in that part of himself more than he does in being a father to his daughter or companion to Cassidy.

And as the credits start rolling with Bruce Springsteen’s song, The Wrestler playing, you can’t help but be moved by the first lyric: “Have you ever seen a one-trick pony in the field so happy and free, have you ever seen a one trick pony then you’ve seen me.”