The Wrestler

Out of all the award-seeking movies this season the only one I was really interested in was The Wrestler. Well it finally opened here and I saw it this weekend. It really is a great movie and is a nice recovery from Aronofsky's laughable The Fountain. But this is largely Mickey Rourke's movie. He completely inhabits the role, which might have not been too much of a stretch. My only gripe is that I knew the whole story from watching the trailer. As a result, there weren't too many surprises. It's basically a dramatization of the stuff shown in Beyond the Mat, including the small venue wrestling shows and poorly attended autograph sessions. Randy 'The Ram' Robinson is a composite of just about every major face wrestler from the 80s. There's even an Iron Sheik-like heel (The Ayatollah) played by Ernest Miller, who serves as Randy's ring nemesis. I think that's one of the awesome things about this movie. Not only does it feature an amazing performance, but it got everything right, down to the minor details. There's a Randy 'The Ram' action figure and even a Nintendo game. While it doesn't paint a glamorous image of the profession, few can deny the authenticity.