Don't write off the film for "flaws"

Rating: 7/10 (31 October 2010)

A documentary style film about a wrestler past his prime, difficult to watch, but ultimately almost masterful. Almost, because as many people have disgustedly pointed out - it has no ending. It just stops, with a smash cut.
It juxtaposes two lives: one, a professional wrestler who deals with the conflict of job and family by trying to put aside the latter, and a stripper who ultimately realises too late she's done the same thing. One is dragging his sequined costume to the end of the line of his career - the stripper is seeing the beginning of the end for hers.
Anyone who complains too much about the triteness of the story should remember that it's actually based on real-life stories of real-life people, there are elements of the lives of Terry Funk (I'm retired, no I'm not), Mick Foley (can't remember things, bodily damage) and Jake the Snake Roberts (estrangement from his daughter), most noticeably. Though no wrestler of Ram's former notoriety has died in the ring, some have found they just simply cannot retire - that life, though its best years are long gone, are akin to a drug that you just can't stop. That's paralleled most hauntingly in the real life CZW wrestler Necro Butcher, appearing as himself, who's not particularly good looking or buff, but instead substitutes a willingness to use a staple gun on his own face to stay in the game. Mickey Rourke has brilliantly managed to capture the essence of a generation of successes and failures in the ring and portray them in their raw glory.
The real casting winner is New Jersey, though. They wanted bleak and hopeless as a backdrop, and in choosing NJ for the role, they overachieved in droves.