The Wrestler weighs heavy

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New on DVD and Blu-ray: Body of Lies, Changeling, Choke

To be sure, The Wrestler offers a perfect match of actor and part as it is written. But what bothers me now, when it didn’t all these past months before I saw the film, is all this talk about the “Resurrection of Mickey Rourke,” because, if anything, his emotive, resonant performance in the film feels more like a swan-song that a phoenix rising up from the self-induced flame-out of his own rocky career. As good and overweight as he was mumbling and brooding through the film, did anyone really watch Apocalypse Now and think “Wow, Marlon Brando is back?”

Rourke’s “old broken down piece of meat” in The Wrestler is that kind of performance. Real and raw and heartbreaking. It’s a great one, but I’m not convinced it’s something Rourke can use to springboard into any kind of rebirth. Certainly the film’s critical success will move him closer to A-List status than he’s been in ages, and there are those who say they never thought he had this kind of performance left in him this side of the 1980s. Well, those people haven’t been paying attention. Rourke was a scene-stealer opposite Jack Nicholson—an actor he was often compared to in the ’80s—in Sean Penn’s 2001 drama The Pledge, and in 2005 he turned in the best performances to be found in two splashy pictures. Every line out of his mouth as hard-nosed Marv in Robert Rodriguez’s comic book thriller Sin City was pure gold, and using the same sensitive bulldog persona now lauded in The Wrestler, Rourke made Tony Scott’s sugary Kiera Knightly-as-a-bounty-hunter movie Domino almost watchable.

But enough about that, let’s get to The Wrestler. Looking all puffy and weird, like a pit bull who lost one too many dog fights, Rourke plays Randy “The Ram” Robinson who was a Hulk Hogan-level wrestling star in mid and late 1980s. With his career, and his hearing, on the downslide, Robinson lives in a trailer park where he plays his official Nintendo game (the original 8-bit version) with the kids next door and his best friend is a jaded stripper played by Maria Tomei. When doctors tell Robinson he can no longer wrestle, he takes a job behind a deli counter and attempts to reconnect with the embittered daughter he all but abandoned 15 years before. Evan Rachel Wood’s turn as Robinson’s daughter, Stephanie, is the film’s beating, often bleeding heart. Nothing says Robinson has made mistakes in his life like the look on Wood’s fragile face.

The Wrestler, alternately heartbreaking and a cold slap in the face, barrels to a point when “The Ram” is offered a high-paying rematch with his biggest rival on the 20th anniversary of their legendary match. Of course Robinson returns to the ring against doctor’s orders, because it is the one place he’s always been shown unconditional adoration. Wrestling is the only thing he is good at, and it’s where he belongs. And in the final match, Rourke’s performance shines.

“I just want to say to you all tonight I’m very grateful to be here,” says “The Ram” to his crowd. “A lot of people told me that I’d never wrestle again and that’s all I do. You know, if you live hard and play hard and you burn the candle at both ends, you pay the price for it. You know in this life you can loose everything you love, everything that loves you. Now I don’t hear as good as I used to and I forget stuff and I aint as pretty as I used to be but god damn it I’m still standing here and I’m The Ram. As times goes by, as times goes by, they say “he’s washed up,” “he’s finished,” “he’s a loser,” “he’s all through.” You know what? The only one that’s going to tell me when I’m through doing my thing is you people here.”

Directed by rebel filmmaker Darren Aronofsky, The Wrestler is an unflinching portrait of a broken man shot documentary style, and it was sadder than I expected. Even Robinson’s triumphs seemed like bittersweet missed opportunities. In those few fleeting moments when his glass is full, I only wished he had a larger glass. “Have you ever seen a one legged man tryin’ to dance his way free,” Bruce Springsteen sings in the last stanza of the film’s theme song. “If you’ve ever seen a one legged man then you’ve seen me.”