The Wrestler
The Wrestler stars Mickey Rourke in a behind the scenes look at the life of an over the hill professional wrestler struggling to make a comeback.
Film making 23/25
Cinematography 23/25
Audio 24/25
Bonus Features 15/25
Total 85/100
Robin Ramzinski was a major star in the professional wrestling business in the 1980’s but today showcases in small wrestling performances. Mickey Rourke stars as Robin or by his ring name Randy “The Ram” Robinson who is an aging professional wrestler meeting at small events signing autographs and fighting other small time wrestlers.
After one event where he and fellow wrestler Necro Butcher use staple guns and barbed wire on each other he has a heart attack which surely will end his wrestling career. He quits the wrestling gigs he has scheduled and tells his promoter that the event scheduled with his onetime adversary The Ayatollah will have to be cancelled.
Robin tells a girl friend, Pam, that he has had a heart attack and she starts to date him outside of her dancing in a strip club which is against the clubs policy. Pam, played by Marisa Tomei, starts to see more of Robin and convinces him to see his daughter that has now grown into a young woman without any help from Robin.
When his relationship with his daughter is looking better he tries to thank Pam with some flowers and a card but Pam rejects his offer. Robin is dejected and goes to a wrestling match where some girls take him to a party where he gets drunk and does cocaine.
Later at his new job as a deli counter sales person in the grocery store he was stocking he gets frustrated when a customer recognizes him. He ends up cutting himself on purpose on the meat slicer and yells at his boss then leaves and calls the promoter to tell him the match is back on.
The match is a great success but Cassidy, Robin’s daughter, arrives and tries to convince him not to wrestle which he ignores. During the fight The Ayatollah is concerned for Randy’s health and asks if he wants to end the match so Randy looks into the audience and does not see Cassidy.
Randy tells him not to and ends the film with him saluting the crowd from his perch atop the ropes in a corner as he is making his signature flying head butt onto his opponent. Throughout the later part of the fight he has been having chest pains and even the other wrestler can see something is not right.
The Wrestler is a great film and well worth watching at least once but may not be for everyone with its rough attitude and violence. One of the things that grabs you into the film is the down to earth filming that I found out later was done in a very short time and in real venues to create a realistic look to the film.
The film shows the real side of professional wrestling and how some things are actually choreographed and planned out as well as the limited career span of a typical wrestler. The over the top use of drugs and violence in the matches and personal lives of the wrestlers are well portrayed such as one scenes where a man is selling Robin drugs.
The Wrestler is a comeback movie of sorts for Mickey Rourke who has been missing from the acting scene for some time and he has done an excellent job portraying Robin Ramzinski. Marisa Tomei and Mickey Rourke were up for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress Academy Awards as well as a host of others.
Mickey Rourke won Golden Globe for Best Actor and the film and others won several lesser awards that just go to show how well liked the film and acting was. The Wrestler is one of the films about a subject such as professional wrestling that you may not enjoy or even like all that much but the film is superbly acted and well worth seeing.
The Blu-ray edition contains the film in all its high definition glory with Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and three bonus features as well as a digital copy of the film. Within The Ring is a making of feature with director Darren Aronofsky and Mickey Rourke talking both about the film and the world of smaller venue wrestling.
The Wrestler was filmed in 37 days with real locations for the wrestling events in between the real World Extreme Wrestling competitions. The director and cast would travel around the East coast and film on these locations and have the sequences filmed in between real wrestling events.
The added realism of using regular people and real events adds to the films real world quality and the events also had plenty of real wrestling for Mickey Rourke. The film also used a real super market to use in the scenes for Robin’s work sequences using both actors and real customers who happened to be there.
Wrestler Round Table is a table discussion including Roddy "Rowdy" Piper, Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake, Dallas Diamond" Page, Greg "The Hammer" Valentine and Lex Luger. They talk about wrestling, the film and acting in an open and honest affair that is quite interesting just sitting around a table and talking on film.
Also included is a Bruce Springsteen music video The Wrestler that adds to the films creative process that is quite good. The Wrestler is a great film and took many by surprise due to its deep look at a man at the end of his life and career in wrestling instead of the world of professional Wrestling.
The Wrestler on Blu-ray is well worth the cost for anyone that wants to see a well acted film portraying the realistic side of a profession many do not really understand fully.