Word: wrestler
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...Anyone who's seen a boxing film will be able to predict the rest of The Wrestler. Randy gets one more chance: a 20-year rematch in Wilmington of his Ayatollah fight. Will he pass it up to save his life? (Not if there's gonna be an Act Three.) And the woman in his life - will Randy manage to connect with his estranged daughter (Wood), who hasn't forgiven him for abandoning her? (That's Act Two, where the only innovation is that the girl's mother is never mentioned). And will a local stripper, well played by Tomei...
...Aronofsky has been one of the few American directors whose movies upset the complacent status quo. Pi, Requiem for a Dream and The Fountain were demanding and rewarding in various ways: the first whacko, the second gritty, the third sumptuously romantic, and all marvelously dense with imagery. The Wrestler is the first Aronofsky film to be visually inert. His main camera habit is to follow Randy, just his imposing back, as he trudges through corridors toward another fight. (Martin Scorsese virtually patented that shot, in Raging Bull and Goodfellas). The trope does pay off later in the film, when Randy...
...Luck of the Draw when the producers refused to let him include his pet chihuahua in the movie." Instead, Rourke, who had been a serious amateur boxer as a teenager, went professional, submitting himself to the rigorous training, abuse and combat that would pay off in The Wrestler...
...deserved.) Reviewers love watching actors abuse their bodies for their art almost as much as actors love doing it. That's one reason Mickey should be a guest of honor at the year-end critics' awards dinners. Another is that Rourke's bio blends with the story of The Wrestler, but with a happier ending. His career has come back from the dead; any award would be like a posthumous prize to someone who is, miraculously, still around to accept...
...even someone like me, who knows in his bones that The Wrestler is bogus, can cheer the return of Mickey Rourke. And not because it's nice that he seems to have turned his life around and focused again on doing what he once did so well, but because the best writers and directors might have to put Rourke on the short list of actors up for great roles. The man from the past has a future again. (See photos of the Venice Film Festival here...