The Wrestler
May 26, 2009 on 2:37 pm | In Uncategorized | No CommentsI have just watched this film by Darren Aronofsky. As I have never been shy about saying, I am a big fan of Aronofsky’s work, which include Pi, Requiem for a Dream, and The Fountain, the last of which is perhaps one of the finest movies I have ever seen. The Wrestler is a more conventional film for Aronfsky (by that I mean more of a traditional narrative), but it is still very much feels like an Aronofsky film. The Wrestler is a whoppingly good film.
Where to begin? First, let’s begin with Mickey Rourke, who plays Randy “The Ram,” an aging wrestler whose famous days are two decades in his past. Still, he slogs through life wrestling at Legions and schools to a small crowd of thrill seekers. One of the ways this film works its magic is that it plays to stereotypes but makes them real and human. The Ram has put his body through pain year after year and it is wearing on him. He scripts the match (not in depth, but in the general outlines). As one follows Ram through the movie and as becomes explicitly clear later on, the crowd (no matter how small) provides as much life to Ram as he knows it’s his job to provide entertainment to the crowd. Why would he suffer through a match as he gets stapled with a staple gun and thrown into barb-wire fencing? One may be tempted to view Rourke’s performance through the prism of his wrestling moves and stunts and willingness to express pain, but where I find Rourke’s performance mesmerizing is in the quiet moments. Ram home alone or playing a Nintendo (very old version) with a local boy, or the emotion he launches through his eyes. The Ram is also a tragic character, and I mean that in the classical sense: The Ram comes to recognize his flaws and that they will bring about his doom and that they are caused by his own actions. We watch this unfold, we watch the Ram come to this understanding and we too understand that what happens must happen.
Marisa Tomei plays Pam “Cassidy,” an aging stripper. She too slogs through life continuing to dance for men who dismiss her because she is older. Only the Ram seems a willing paying customer. Cassidy too is a stereotype that has a human core. She cannot and will not cross the line of interacting with customers outside the strip joint. But (this is one a piece of magic in the movie that I cannot figure out how it is accomplished) Cassidy and the Ram clearly feel more for each other than a straight customer/stripper relationship.
OK, I’m leaving out a ton…the relationship between the Ram and his estranged daughter, the parallels and symbols, etc., because as with any Aronofsky film, it is too rich, too full to adequately discuss. His films make me want to discuss them, to interact with people to spend hours on the construction, script, etc. The thing I want to mention the most, however, is what makes this movie so real, so amazing is that the characters have a life onscreen, they extend beyond the celluloid. All have a past and a future unknown to the viewer but that informs their actions and motivations and thoughts, and we as the viewer understand that.
It’s really sad to know that Aronofsky had such a difficult time funding a film of this quality.
Leave a Reply
