Movie Review: 'The Wrestler' is Oscar-worthy character study

Director Darren Aronofsky and actor Mickey Rourke are a cinematic team that could not help but find themselves working together.

Aronofsky has said in recent interviews that he had Rourke in mind from the word "go" for his latest film, "The Wrestler." There was no better, nor more obvious, choice. Rourke, as struggling professional wrestler Randy "The Ram" Robinson, reminds the viewer of the real Mickey Rourke - a great actor whose best days may seem to be behind him but a man dedicated to his craft and not afraid to take a punch when the situation requires it.

I have been watching movies with friend Terry Cone since 1976. We have very similar tastes and enjoy a multitude of shared memories, in-jokes and insights into film. So when she whispered to me 15 minutes into "The Wrestler" that she would need a shower when she got home, I understood. This movie - like Barbet Schroeder's loose biopic of writer Charles Bukowski (starring Rourke) - is so gritty as to induce a strong need to bathe after seeing it. That is not meant as a criticism, merely an observation.

While it will never be mistaken for a feel-good movie, "The Wrestler" is a great character study, a cathartic piece of drama and rich in the life lessons that, as any mature person understands, are not always pretty or kind.

Aronofsky toys with the viewer in the opening scenes. We never get a full view of The Ram/Rourke's face until the time is just right. It's an emotional moment and presents a weight that the viewer must carry through the remainder of the film.

Randy is 20 years past his prime but is still wrestling. The venues are small and the purses even smaller. Randy lives in a New Jersey mobile home park and has trouble even keeping current on the rent for his trailer.

He's estranged from his daughter, Stephanie (the excellent Evan Rachel Wood), and trying to strike up an affair with a stripper named Cassidy, played by Marisa Tomei, who has developed into an actress of contention. Sure, she won an Oscar for her role in "My Cousin Vinny," but she is now making some grittier choices that many in the category of "beautiful movie star" would not even consider. Tomei could get roles that didn't require her to disrobe - or put it in her contract that even when playing a stripper she would remain covered - but she seems to realize what an actress needs to do to flesh out (no pun intended) a character.

Cassidy's career is much like Randy's. She's well past her glory days but has no qualms about doing what she can to make a life for herself and her child. Randy is desperately in love with her, but she's adamant that she doesn't date customers. Usually she doesn't.

Besides Cassidy, Randy only connects with other aging wrestlers on the lowball circuit and the fans who still worship them.

Disaster strikes when, before a match, Randy has a heart attack. After surgery, the doctors tell him his days as "The Ram" are over and going back in the ring would be risking death.

This brings on a life change. Cassidy has been telling him for a long time to reach out to his daughter. He does, and things almost go perfectly, but Randy is a character (like many of us in real life) who continually shoots himself in the foot.

To make ends meet, he gets more work at a local supermarket where he has been unloading trucks. But, as we all already know, Randy "The Ram" Robinson is not the kind of man who can readily work behind the deli counter, weighing out pickles and potato salad.

An upcoming event featuring many of Randy's peers catches his eye and he decides, even while studying the large surgical scar on his chest, that he is going to go back to wrestling. It is, after all, what he does, what defines who he is.

The final act of "The Wrestler" takes place in the ring with "The Ram" facing a bad-guy wrestler (actually a friend of Randy's) whose schtick is playing an Osama bin Laden-type character. These scenes, along with earlier in-ring footage - one wrestler's gimmick is using a staple gun and, at one point, Randy secretly cuts himself with a razor, because the crowd loves blood - are among the most dazzling wrestling/boxing scenes ever committed to film. Director of Photography Maryse Alberti achieves a gritty, documentary-style look throughout, and the steadicam work in the ring is as good as I've ever seen.

If you saw him in "Sin City" - and when you see him in "The Wrestler" - you know Mickey Rourke isn't going to win a beauty contest. But he could win an Oscar. Both he and Tomei have been nominated.

After a slight misfire with the film "The Fountain," Aronofsky, who directed "Pi" and "Requiem For a Dream," is back doing what he does best: making us uncomfortable with his unflinching eye for the human condition.

Jim Wunderle owns Wunderle Sound Services and is a Springfield freelance writer and musician. He can be reached at info@wunderlesound.com.