The Wrestler - Rob Culpepper

I picked up The Wrestler, which I had heard was award-worthy, at a Redbox. If you don't know what a Redbox is, it's a modern movie dispenser you find at various stores. This one was at a Wal-mart in Vestavia Hills, AL for those of you who know where that is. I was thinking that Redboxes are a kind of working man's Netflix, but now that I think about this one being located in Vestavia and not in Leeds, AL, I'm not so sure. Well, that aside-

The Wrestler is a great film for a couple of reasons.

1) Mickey Roarke. I don't know why people in Hollywood hate Mickey Roarke or why movie-watchers love him so much. Maybe because he doesn't give sh*t about anything, really. People talk about Roarke the way they talk about Daniel Day-Lewis. The words Outsider and Loner are too weak. Misanthrope is too nuanced. Bad ass is too general. Somewhere among those terms is where both of them lie. I guess what I love about Roarke is that he's a solid actor who has worked hard for years. Sometimes he gets good parts, sometimes he doesn't. Some of his movies do well, others don't. He's really particular and demanding in the way of good artists. I bet he's hard to work with. But what he turns out in terms of acting is, in many cases including this one, very good. Also, he has an amazing face. Roarke was Aronofsky's first choice for the film. The studio wanted Nic Cage. Aronofsky hired Roarke so the studio didn't give him much of a budget. Roarke worked for no pay on the movie and turned in a performance that, finally, got him some critical attention.

2) 16mm film. Nobody shoots on 16mm film anymore. I heard recently that the NFL still does (which is so cool). But nobody else does. It used to be the medium of film students and poor filmmakers. 16mm is a lot cheaper than 35mm. It also has a grainer look because of how it's resized onto 35mm film. I think the choice of using 16mm film adds (or rather, makes) the look of the movie. That's a gutsy decision if you're a Hollywood director.

3) 35 Days. That's what they scheduled for shooting. They actually finished in something like 41 or 42. Most films these days take a lot longer to make. Gone are the early days when a film was shot in 2 weeks. Some films now take 6 months to shoot. This film seems to have an immediacy about it. You get the sense that a lot of the action was done in a take or two. This adds a lot to the rawness of the whole story. It's not polished and that makes it work so much better.

4)The Story. It's simple, which is hard to do. In most Hollywood movies the plot is primary and everything else supports that, including the characters. The Wrestler is just the opposite. Yeah, things happen that get you from the beginning to the end, but mostly it just follows this grizzled, has-been wrestler around as he tries to cope with aging: he tries to fix his relationship with his daughter, he tries to work a dead-end job, he tries to quit wrestling. If you were in a middle literature class you'd have the words to describe the conflict in the story: man vs. himself, man vs. the world, man vs. death, man vs. wrestler. That makes it accessible to anybody. One thing I would be curious to hear is how this movie did in Europe, because in so many ways, from setting to characterization, it's a really American movie.

I should also mention that Marisa Tomei is great. She plays a stripper whose better days are gone. Between her character and Roarke's you get a really good conversation about values and what really matters. And even though they and their issues are very 'blue collar,' the questions they wrestle with (sorry) are universal and worth thinking on.

The Wrestler is a Must See. You can tell it was a labor of love, not made to make money or to win awards, but just to tell a good story. But, like most things in which producing good art is prime, this film did it all. You can find it where I turned it in at the Vestavia Hills Wal-mart Redbox, and probably other places too.