It is ironic that in the same year Jack Nicholson was faulted for merely playing himself as the 1989 Joker, Mickey Rourke shows just how effective this relationship can be. Rourke plays out his life in 115 minutes as Randy 'The Ram' Robinson; a former icon now reduced to school hall signings and amateur fight nights. "You never really stopped acting" an interviewer once said to Mickey Rourke, "yeah but I acted in a lot of crap" Rourke tactfully replied.
It is in his performance that Rourke gives the film its real resonance but it is in that which is represented that provides the film with its strangest interest. In refusing to belittle the sport (or stage) of wrestling director Darren Aronofsky has created something of an eye-opener. The films' opening backstage scenes reveal the workings of these fights as pseudo-improvised acting and presents the wrestlers themselves as respectful-if rather odd fusions of actors, bodybuilders and athletes. On the more extreme end The Wrestler showcases the more dangerous side of 'Hardcore' wrestling, which includes (in this case the very real use) of staple guns, barbed wire and planks of wood. More importantly, the films shows the long term self destruction of its stars. Rourke's character is battered and worn out; his heart collapsing under the years of steroid abuse necessary for his physique, his finances nonexistent and his family no longer apparent. Alone except for the stripper he visits almost every night Randy seeks redemption with his estranged daughter and wishes to form something more with the stripper he visits.
These are familiar themes for any sports drama but rarely are they handled with such an unnatural sense of realism. The direction is almost documentary-esque and the soundtrack never seeps into anything more than ambience. But it is again the performances that give the film its added weight. The 45 year old Marisa Tomei plays stripper Cassidy with the same kind of realisation as Rourke plays 'The Ram'. Too old to be doing what she does her life runs parallel to Randy's in the same way that her playing a stripper at 45 (no matter how good she looks) mirrors her character. Evan Rachel Wood as the forgotten daughter may or may not have been abandoned when she was younger but her startling transformation in the equally self destructive Thirteen at least gives her some experience in the unhinged daughter role.
Against the weight of all other films The Wrestler presents something far crueller. For all the fame, for all the glory Randy has lost everything to that which he loves and there are some pains that just can't be healed and there are some realities we don't want to face. "The only place I get hurt is out there" he plainly tells Cassidy at the start of the films heart breaking climax. There is humour along the way, but it's bittersweet as it always carries the further realisation of how out of touch Randy is with the world. The scenes where he is trying to find a present for his daughter or when he plays a videogame with one of his neighbours are brilliantly portrayed but they build up: fusing with the moments of him just trying to get by, or when he's at autograph signings-the camera lingering on the canes and wheelchairs of his associates. It results in a film that combines self loathing, obsession, narcissism and redemption to create a character that could not be played by anyone better, by anyone else. And as the final shot fades to black you couldn't ask for a better ending; leaving you to ponder for a few weighted moments over the only conclusion that can be drawn, just long enough to hear Bruce Springsteen quietly count the film into the credits, and sum up Rourke's character in one mournful line: "If you've ever seen a one trick pony then you've seen me."