"The Wrestler": High Hopes Dashed On the Sharp Rocks of Puritanical Cliche

The teenaged girl I carry within me who hails from the late 1980s, the one who fuelled her first dirty, heterosexual fantasies with films such as  "Nine 1/2 Weeks" and "Wild Orchid" starring a much younger and less bashed-in looking Mickey Rourke, the teenaged girl whose suburban fatigue had her clinging to the gritty glamour of the down and out in "Barfly", had a lot of hope invested in her first viewing of director Darren Aronofsky's latest highly acclaimed film, "The Wrestler".  I am sad to say, though, that her high hopes were dashed on the sharp rocks of puritanical cliches.

Mickey Rourke's no longer adorable face is perfect for his role in Aronofsky's distressed film after a mid-life boxing career that began in the 1990s reshaped his appearance into a hardened and disfigured mockery of his former good looks.  "The Wrestler" features Mickey Rourke as Randy "The Ram" Robinson, an ageing pro-wrestler whose better days have faded, leaving him to fight in front of small crowds in community centers and school gymnasiums.  The man who once had fans flocking for his signature and starred in wrestling videos and computer games now stares down the double-barrelled gun of isolation after a drug-addicted life on the road and health concerns that threaten to end him altogether.  Despite the tragic path his life has taken, he still manages to be a man with a notable degree of moral fiber and a true heart, which is why I would have loved for this film to give him a little more depth with which to work than it did.

The females in his dismal little life — his lesbian daughter, Stephanie (Evan Rachel Wood), and a stripper love interest, Cassidy (Marisa Tomei) — although apparently powerful characters within the arc of Randy's story, are simply fleshed out versions of the stereotypical virgin and whore.  Because of this, his relationships with them tend to barely broach a deeper sentiment than surface wish-fulfillment, which is too bad, because Randy "The Ram" Robinson is a character whose pained soul is brought to stark relief through Rourke's brilliant portrayal of the gritty realities of his emotionally solitary existence.  Randy Robinson's story deserved better than to to limit its charater and story development by binding a full two-thirds of its leading cast members to the tired partriarchal dichotomy of the virgin and the whore.  As a result, I felt cheated out of the truly larger than life character that Randy Robinson could have become.  Instead, about two-thirds of the way through "The Wrestler", I was left feeling that I was no longer under the spell of suspension of disbelief.  He'd had his way with me and then left me hanging. I wanted to run out and watch a film that could finish the job.

It will be no surprise to you, then, that the story also follows an arc very like that of the life of Jesus Christ, right down to family issues with a virgin, somewhat innocent relationship with a whore, barbed wire as a crown of thorns, and a striking a crucified Christ pose with a halo of stage lighting behind him to name few wet fish with which I was hit over the head.  I went into the film assuming a certain degree of originality, and when it fell away over the course of the film to reveal what felt like a mere sketch over a religious figure, I lost the magic.  By the final scene, which had all the set-up to be a magnificent display of courage and self-sacrifice to which the entire movie had been building since his opening pre-dawn stumbling into a ramshackle trailerpark, I had had what magic remained virgined, whored, and metaphored right out of me.  I couldn't follow Randy Robinson heart and soul into the final moments of the film.  I'd lost that delicate thread of faith.

If there is one thing I can say about "The Wrestler", though, it is that Mickey Rourke gives such a stunning performance free from personal vanity and unnecessary flourish, he is so much Randy "The Ram" Robinson (even his initials are triparted, if you needed any more suggestive influence), that I felt guilty at the end for not believing him anymore.

Jesus - 1, "The Wrestler" - 0