Not as perfect a film as is being said, but a great character study that subverts the sports genre to be suitably drab and real (which is a compliment)

Rating: Null/10 (23 January 2009)

After the imagination and creativity shown in The Fountain, The Wrestler initially strikes the viewer as a bit of a disappointment because director Darren Aronofsky appears to have gone to the other extreme of style and has delivered a film that is very much in the real world, with no flights of fancy and no real visual flair to it. However in the same way as The Fountain was about the heart of the central male character, The Wrestler is the same, just with a totally different character struggling with a totally different set of emotions. As a faded wrestler, Randy "The Ram" Robinson is living in a trailer park where he can barely keep up the rent, during the week he works a manual job in the stock room of a local supermarket and at weekends he dons his costume and takes part in wrestling events in small and only partially filled leisure centres and halls.
The nature of the character has been talked to death already, mainly because of the actor playing him and how good his performance is, but Randy is a fairly simplistic character on paper. Indeed the whole film has a very simple concept right down to the "stripper with the heart of gold", and in different hands this would have been more uplifting than it is but then also less realistic and less interesting. As it is The Wrestler delivers a singularly grim depiction of a man unsure of what to do in life and clinging to the buzz he still gets performing in front of the dwindling crowds even though the personal cost of this is clear in every part of his life. It is almost documentarian in its approach and often the camera is following Randy rather than moving in such a way to inform the viewer (although it does this as well). This makes the film feel very bleak and, like Randy himself, perhaps that it is not really going to go anywhere. Those still looking for a big redemption or sporting achievement have been watching too many generic sports movie and have not been paying attention to the way this is being told.
So what is it about the visually "straight" delivery and grimy and very downbeat story that makes this film worth seeing? Well, the awards chatter will already have told you that because what makes it is the performances that bring the film to life. Without these Aronofsky's twisting of the sports genre looking at faded male hopes would have been an interesting but quite dull affair and I think he knows this which is why his focus is so much on the characters. Much has been made of the parallels between Rourke and his character but such commentary detracts from his performance, which is great. It is not in one dialogue scene or one specific thing he does, but Rourke manages to utterly convince as Randy in his mannerism, the way he carries himself, the small moments of joy he has, the look he has in his eyes and the pain (physical and emotional) that his life has brought him to. That there isn't a clear "Oscar clip" is a sign of how good it is because it is not something he "delivers" so much as "is". The same could be said for Tomei, although again some have detracted from her turn by focusing on the fact that her body is fantastic (which admittedly it is; not "for her age"  just fantastic). She doesn't have as much time to shine but she becomes more impressive when you consider that, on paper, her character is a real cliché that is like a direct shadow of Randy in terms of situation (aging out of the only world she knows). That she makes it better than this is down to how much she gets out of her eyes and face. They work well together but she does feel like she is acting whereas Rourke convinces totally.
Despite what the voters on this site say (the 60th best film EVER! Really?) The Wrestler is not a great film that will blow you away at any point. Indeed I think many people will be surprised by how slow and slightly drab it is. However where it is strongest is in the area it sets out to be all about  a character study. This aspect works thanks to Aronofsky sticking close to his subjects even if it is grim or dull and by getting great performances from the two central performers. As a total film then, I thought it was good but not great and that it has benefited generally from how good Rourke is in it. Worth seeing but don't let the hype mislead you into expecting something that The Wrestler never pertains to be.