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The Wrestler

Review By: Brian Otano
BrianOtano@TheCinemaSource.com

The Wrestler is a film by a director attempting to reclaim his former glory, about a fallen professional wrestling star’s attempt to reclaim his former glory, who happens to be played by an actor attempting to—right, you get the picture.

Director/Producer Darren Aronofsky, never one to shy away from shedding light on the hopelessness and truth of the human experience, gives us an uncompromising, yet good humored look at the life of a man trying to body slam his way back from the sidelines to the top of his game.

The film opens with a tracking shot of Randy “the Ram” Robinson’s “fame wall,” a collage of promotional posters and wrestling publication clips, all proclaiming Randy’s dominance of the world of professional wrestling. This is as close as we get to “the Ram” of the glorious 80’s. In the next glimpse, our unlikely hero sits in the corner of a church recreation room weathered and broken down, the biggest, saddest relic in a room full of discarded toys and outdated books.

Such is the life of this professional wrestler, played with understated humility and grace by Mickey Rourke. On the fringes of the industry, Randy is caught in steroid cycles, working in the community center wrestling circuit on weekends while slumming it at a day job in the local grocery store. He regularly comes home to marshal locks on his trailer doors in Podunk, New Jersey and resorts to sleeping in his van. The details of his comings-and-goings, the dye-jobs and workouts, shopping excursions for props and steroids, as well as the pre-match negotiations of the fights between wrestlers are all mapped out with blazing clarity. The sum of all these factors equals a film that is at times hard to watch, as much because of its unflinching honesty as for its over-the-top wrestling play-violence.

On his downtime, Randy commiserates with another cast-off of his generation, an aging stripper at a charming roadside establishment known as “Cheeques.” Pam (Marisa Tomei), who goes by Cassidy when she’s rocking the body glitter and working the pole, is a kindred spirit who shares Randy’s longing for their lost glory days, when hair metal ruled and Cobain hadn’t come along to ruin all the fun. The understanding and chemistry shared by Tomei and Rourke are the heart and soul of the film. As two people trying to get out from under, they strike all the right balances with salty wit and warmth.

When a heart attack calls an end to his wrestling career, Randy faces the neglected areas of his life, which looks pretty bleak. At Pam’s suggestion, Randy shifts his focus from wrestling to his estranged daughter Stephanie (Evan Rachel Wood), who up to that point of the film had gone unmentioned. The reception Randy ...