Many who know me know that I have really loved this movie and
recently purchased it on DVD. I have not anticipated a movie so much to
come out in a long time. It's pretty clear, I am too busy watching
other things but this movie hit home with me in a way only few can
understand.
When I was younger and still in
school, my weekends would usually consist of finding a local wrestling
show in the central Indiana area. These were the kinds of shows which
would usually feature either local people who just wanted to have some
fun, aspiring wrestlers, and the ones who just can't get out which is
in many ways what this is based upon. The more shows I saw, the more
people I got to know and the more involved I would get. I would
eventually start ring announcing from time to time. It was there I got
to know these people and what good people most of them are where even
the ring announcer gets respect. I have also seen many people just like
Randy "The Ram" Robinson. Getting involved in theater took away from
the wrestling but theater is what I am addicted to but I still love to
see a show here and there.
I came to hear about
this when I was in Netflix looking for a movie of the same title from
1974 that I heard about and I saw something that had not been released
yet and then I saw two words that threw me into all kinds of
excitement. Those words were Mickey Rourke. I then looked to see what
this was about and what I read actually sounded compelling for a
change. What we have had are things like READY TO RUMBLE, NACHO LIBRE,
NO HOLDS BARRED, well, you get the drift. I am also a fan of Mickey
Rourke and I was just so excited. I was telling a handful of people on
this and they could not understand how someone as "old" as Mickey
Rourke could play a wrestler. Well, it's simple. Wrestling is a hard
industry to get out of and at the time, his life was quite parallel to
his character.
The first time I saw the
preview of this movie on Youtube, I was blown away by Mickey Rourke. He
was perfect for that role and I just could not wait for it to come out.
I usually do not take bootlegs but in this situation a guy I work with
had a copy and I could not resist. I took it home and while it was a
bad transfer, I really enjoyed the movie and I was ready for it to come
to theaters. Mickey Rourke was great. I heard that Nicolas Cage at one
time had the role and was even going to Ring of Honor shows to get into
the character but backed out. I am very grateful to Nicolas Cage for
that because Rourke was born for this role. From what I understand,
Aronofsky always wanted Rourke but the studio wanted Nicolas Cage which
shows that more freedom needs to be given to the directors and writers.
It
took a long time for it to come to Indiana and after awhile after
limited patience, it was in Muncie so my friend Lisa brought her
brother and my friend Larry with her and we saw this on the big screen.
I loved it even more after I saw it in theaters.
Now to the
movie. Mickey Rourke plays an independent wrestler named Randy "The
Ram" Robinson who seemed to have quite a bit of success in the '80s but
now he is working local shows, living in a trailer and works for a
grocery store. Each time he does what he has to in order to get through
a match which includes drugs. After having a heart attack, his doctor
told him that he should retire where he now leaves all that he knows.
He wants to have more of a romantic relationship with Pam, played very
well by Marisa Tomei, who works as a stripper and likes him but will
not cross her "line" with customers. He also has an estranged daughter
named Stephanie, played here by Evan Rachel Wood, who is very bitter
towards her father and he obviously was not there for her like he
should have been. Being a father has also always been a struggle in his
life. We understand her feelings but we also know Randy wants that
relationship but he does not know how to do it right. I also noticed
that Wood was perfectly cast as his daughter because I noticed a
similar chin that is pointed out a bit and she was very good in her
small part.
I thought one of the saddest scenes was when he was
at the American Legion for an autograph signing where there was very
little turnout and the rest of the wrestlers there seemed like even
bigger has-beens than him. He also is still obsessed with the match he
had 20 years ago with "The Ayotallah" which was probably his most
high-profile match where he has a game set-up on his Nintendo, the
original one, and invites a kid from the trailer park to play but the
kid deems it very old and brings up games that Randy has never heard
of. With all the struggles, he decides that wrestling is his place and
believes that the rematch with The Ayotallah is his ticket back to the
top. Wrestler Ernest "The Cat" Miller plays Ayotallah and there are
many other wrestlers.
I admit that the first time I watched
this, I thought this was going to be a ROCKY-type formula where
everyone was going to get behind him and support his comeback but I was
totally wrong and I was glad. This was a character study of a man's
struggle to make any other life for himself. A very significant line is
when he says "The only place I get hurt is out there". Many wrestlers
have the troubled relationships with their children which can be seen
in the 1999 documentary BEYOND THE MAT with Jake Roberts and his
daughter.
Darren Aronofsky was the director and put together a
great movie on wrestling and looking into the independent world of
wrestling. Mickey Rourke worked very hard for this movie and even
getting training from Afa of the Wild Samoans. In the beginning, there
are some pretty brutal moments, especially when he had the "Death
Match" with the real-life wrestler The Necro Butcher. Rourke won a lot
of awards for this including winning a Golden Globe and being nominated
for an Oscar. Bruce Springsteen also got a big hit song of the movie
title.
I just purchased the DVD and I would have liked to have seen more but
the making-of documentary was very informative on both the making of
the movie and even the world of independent wrestling. It's
unfortunate that even when it was winning awards, it was still not
given much advertisement. I don't believe I ever saw a preview on tv,
I always had to show people the youtube video on my ipod touch. People
had no idea what I was talking about when it first started coming out.
I'm not exactly the best review writer which is one of the biggest
reasons I do the blog I do but this one is very personal to my heart
and I am willing to make arrangements to show this movie to people so
if you are interested and live in Muncie, maybe on the outskirts, just
send me a message and we'll make the arrangements for you to see this
phenomenal movie. If you haven't checked out my blog from this week,
please do so and stay tuned next week for another installment of Shaun
Berk's 10 Movie Recommendations.
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