Flying Festival Forearm!

Well, I've had a few days to recover from my sleep deficit and I've been getting questions all week like how were the films, did you see any good movies did you see any stars. Well 28 films in 10 days, (really 8 days I took Sunday off to watch the NFL and the last Friday to go to the Zoo with my Niece and Nephew) things get a little confused and it's tough to remember what directors or stars you saw. I saw many good films but only one that really stands out in my mind as outstanding.

My favourite film of the Festival had to be Darren Arnofsky's soon to be released "The Wrestler". The film stars Mickey Rourke as the 'Passion of the Christ' christ-like figure, 50 something wrestler Randy "The Ram" Robinson and Marisa Tomei plays the "Mary Magdalene" like stripper pseudo-girlfriend. There is an explicit allusion to the Rourke character taking a 2 hr beating for mankinds sins, but the film is not high art, the film is as Aronofsky described it a "small gentle film". Rourke's performance is outstanding, the film won the top prize at the Venice film festival and all week, along with JCVD, kept coming up in weekly publications, in conversations in line or in theaters, as the two films everybody was talking about.

Rourke's character "The Ram" is a former top wrestling star, in ring a high flying off the top rope wrestler, a charismatic "face", but like so many wrestlers outside of the ring his life is a mess, struggles with drugs, alcohol, struggling with chronic pain, struggling to pay the rent on his trailer, to keep up with younger stronger wrestlers, trying to reconnect his estranged college student daughter. The Randy character through all his turmoils is extremely likable, encouraging to the boys in the locker room and hamming it up with the neighborhood kids who adore him even though they are too young to remember him in his prime. The character's likableness makes his struggles all that more compelling a man who has given his entire life to entertaining the masses and has nothing to show for it, he just keeps screwing things up. The in ring and behind the scenes wrestling footage seems really authentic mostly because it is filmed in real high school gyms and small house shows in the New Jersey area, put on by real independent promotions. The most disturbing footage is the death match Rourke has with "Hellbilly", (really CZW's Necro Butcher, a Mick Foley Cactus Jack style extreme wrestler). The match features staple guns, glass windows, garbage cans, barb wire, prosthetic leg shots and an exploding ring. If you are a wrestling fan the action is authentic and if you aren't a fan it's a compelling look into this world. The film features cameo appearances by former TNA wrestler Ron "The Truth" Killings and WCW Wrestler Ernest "The Cat" Miller as the Iron Sheik like former top '80s heel "The Ayatollah. The film failed to win the People's Choice Award, that went to Danny Boyle's "Slum Dog Millionaire", but this film is without a doubt my favourite it really is a "small gentle film", a small gentle chairshot to the head that is.