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Moriarty @ AFI Fest: Aronofsky’s THE WRESTLER!
SPOILER ALERT !!
Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here.
Darren Aronofsky’s best movie. Easily.
That’s the short answer.
Mickey Rourke’s awesome. And for the first time in a long time, I mean that in a specific and not a general way.
Let’s disconnect from the boring routine of awards talk and just discuss what it is he brings to the table as a performer. I’m a Rourke fan from the start. He was a hero to film fans when he started to stand out in small, interesting performances. BODY HEAT gave him a nice moment or two, and he made the most of it. DINER was a favorite for me and my friends from the moment we saw it, a much-quoted much-imitated favorite. And Rourke, in particular, was a big part of why. He followed up with RUMBLE FISH, which was another big film for me and my buddies. He was The Motorcycle Boy, for god’s sake. And then, to cement the reputation that was building from film to film, he made THE POPE OF GREENWICH VILLAGE. Which is, for the record, crazy fucking good.
And then whatever. Lots of years of whatever. Rourke is the patron saint of bad choices. He’s done a lot wrong over the years, and he’s squandered the goodwill that pretty much any discerning film fan felt when he was starting out. Even in the weird and lean years, he was spinning gold in all sorts of films. ANGEL HEART. BARFLY. JOHNNY HANDSOME. YEAR OF THE DRAGON. THE RAINMAKER. He’s been relegated to the occasional interesting cameo or stunt casting like his turn as Marv in SIN CITY, which I quite liked. I thought it was the right use of him, since he’s a cartoon these days. And I don’t mean that in a mean way or a superficial way. Whatever Rourke has done to himself over the years, it’s been catastrophic. The young man of 1982 and 1983 is buried in there somewhere, and occasionally, his eyes peer out of this calcium mask, this lump of scar tissue and sadness that is Mickey Rourke’s head. Occasionally, his smile surfaces, just for a moment, plays across his features just enough to remind you just how movie-star pretty he was, and then it’s gone. But those moments are all deployed to devastating effect here.
This isn’t just me waxing rhapsodic about Rourke’s former glory, either. That’s easy, but it really wouldn’t matter if this film wasn’t good. And it’s more than good. The script by Robert D. Siegel is very small scale, very quiet, and even the moments where things crescendo are played as small controlled exchanges of emotional gunfire rather than giant double-barreled histrionics. Rourke plays Randy “The Ram” Robinson, a professional wrestler who was once a huge name in the big show. The opening titles, making exceptional use of Quiet Riot, lay out Randy’s glory days as a montage of articles and programs and photographs and merchandise. And then, with a hard cut to “20 Years Later” and Rourke sitting half-naked in a locker room, Aronfsky tells you exactly what you’re in for. This is not ROCKY. This is not a sports movie in any traditional genre sense. Instead, it’s a movie about living past your expired-by date, somehow continuing after it seems like most of the world would prefer for you to give up. Randy still makes a living... but just barely. The places he plays now are community rec centers and armories, warehouse spaces instead of real arenas. The glory days of the Garden are long since gone, and for the first time, the magnificent wreck that is Mickey Rourke makes perfect sense with the character. I was concerned that the film was going to be maudlin or too obvious in its attempts to jerk those tears. But it’s the opposite. The film earns every single bit of emotion that it asks you to feel because it never pushes for it. Either you’re going to feel an empathic connection to Randy, or you’re not, and I did from the moment he appeared onscreen. I think it’s an amazing, human piece of work, and it’s a reminder that the name everyone threw around critically during the early days of Rourke’s career was “Brando,” and with this film, I think he’s earned that comparison in the most complete and complimentary way ever. This is the sort of performance that ON THE WATERFRONT and STREETCAR promised to audiences when they exploded onto the screen in the ‘50s. This is the sort of honest portrayal of the uncommon soul of the most common of men that I can think of in a while, and I think it takes someone like Rourke to make it work. When his daughter Stephanie (Evan Rachel Wood) screams at him, “YOU! ARE! A! FUCK-UP!”, no one else could stand there and absorb that statement and embody it in quite the way that Rourke can. Randy can’t argue with that. Doesn’t even try. Only complete failure after great success can teach you the kind of humility on display here. You can’t fake it. You can’t act it because you can’t fully understand that kind of loss. Rourke does.
And what pushes it over the top is that it’s not a one-man show. This isn’t just “Awww, look at poor Mick... er, Randy.” That wouldn’t be enough for me to say that this is the best film Aronofsky’s made so far. I am a huge fan of his three films so far, each in a different way, and I love the precision of them, the particular voice that you could see evolve from film to film. But at the same time, that sort of filmmaking can become a trap. I think Wes Anderson is in danger of trapping himself into a style that he can’t shake, even if the material calls for it. I’d like to think that he could make a film that didn’t look like RUSHMORE and TENENBAUMS and LIFE AQUATIC and DARJEELING... but I don’t know if he’s got another BOTTLE ROCKET in him, another shaggy little story that feels spontaneous and loose and lived-in. And until now, I didn’t know if Aronofsky had one of those in him, either, which makes THE WRESTLER such a complete charmer. In his intro to the film at the AFI Fest screening tonight, he called the movie “an experiment,” and I bet it was. I’ll bet he set a whole different set of challenges and criteria for himself on this film than he ever has before. I lovelovelove the collaboration he’s had so far with Matthew Libatique, his cinematographer on his first three films, but it was a brilliant choice to hire Maryse Alberti to shoot this one. Alberti’s best known for documentary work, like the amazing CRUMB or the recent Oscar-winner TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, while also being a longtime collaborator with Todd Haynes and the shooter of such films as JOE GOULD’S SECRET, HAPPINESS, and THE ONION MOVIE. His documentary background serves Aronofsky well here, as the camera is an active participant, right there close to Randy through the entire movie, right up close on those eyes. And with Cassidy (Marisa Tomei), the stripper who Randy harbors a not-so-secret love for, the camera is unforgiving. I think Tomei is incredibly sexy these days, but there’s not a moment in this movie where she doesn’t look every day of her forty-something years alive. She looks like a real woman, without any glamour or special lighting and filters. There’s the make-up she wears onstage at the club, but Alberti gets it right, lets you see past that. Same with Evan Rachel Wood, who positively glows in a lot of the films she’s made. Cinematographers can play up the peaches’n’cream complexion and her eyes and her hair, but Alberti goes the other way, shooting her so she looks like a fairly typical girl in her 20s. She’s pretty, but there’s nothing “movie star” about her here.
The supporting cast features some interesting work from stand-up comics Todd Barry and Judah Friedlander, and neither one is doing overtly comic work. Friedlander in particular is almost unrecognizable at first, and as a guy who makes his living promoting autograph shows and tiny wrestling events, he doesn’t overplay it or try to make it funny. Barry plays Wayne, the manager at the grocery store where Randy picks up extra hours to supplement his income. I also really liked Ernest Miller, who plays Randy’s greatest opponent in the ring, The Ayatollah, who retired years ago and who agrees to a 20th anniversary rematch with Randy. He’s not in much of the film, but he’s great. All the guys who play Randy’s opponents in the ring do really solid work. There’s one guy, The Necro Butcher, who plays a sort of hillbilly wrestler with a penchant for using a staple gun in the ring, who is pretty amazing in his big in-the-ring scene with Randy. And the cutting of that sequence is probably the most “considered” out of the entire film, as Aronofsky fiddles with time, but just a wee little bit, showing us how fucked up Randy is after the fight just before he shows us the moments in the fight that led to each new nick, hole, or gash. Great stuff. There’s another fight, this one opposite a mohawked guy, that really works because we see them discussing their plan for the match ahead of time, and then executing it, and they both really excel at showing us how even if you know who’s going to win, there’s nothing “fake” about what these guys are doing. It is a sport, it is a performance, and it is physical punishment on a level that I can’t imagine enduring for years and years and years. I can’t imagine any professional wrestler being upset by the way the film portrays the lifestyle. It’s as honest as BEYOND THE MAT, Barry Blaustein’s great documentary, and it definitely shows what sort of physical and spiritual toll it can take to leave that much of yourself out there on the mat every single night.
I love everything about the film. I love the choice to use a lot of ‘80s hair metal on the soundtrack. I love when Cassidy and Randy commiserate over just how much the ‘90s sucked. I love Tomei’s work as a woman who tells herself whatever she needs to in order to face her job every night. I love the matter of fact way some of the film’s biggest emotional moments unfold, how we cut right into a few of them, already in progress, so nothing feels like conventional scene structure.
And I love the ending. The whole thing, right down to the absolute right last shot. Endings can be difficult, but Aronofsky absolutely knows how to wrap this one up, and that Bruce Springsteen song is perfectly placed over those end credits, exactly the song we need as the final moments resonate. I was deeply moved tonight by every choice made in bringing this simple story of The Ram’s efforts to live a life on his terms, doing what he loves, with as much heart as possible. I don’t think it’s an overstatement to call it a great movie, and one I think will stand as a very special entry in the filmographies of all involved.
Special thanks to the AFI Fest for the invite to tonight’s centerpiece gala screening, and I sincerely wish Fox Searchlight all the luck in the world with this one. This deserves to find a big huge broad audience. There’s nothing arthouse about this. It’s MARTY for the 21st century, honest heartbreak that I hope is embraced in a big way when it’s released later this year.
Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles
Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles
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I think Pi and Requiem are both great films, and I adore the Fountain. The fact that you found this to be a better film than those is exciting. When's it getting released?
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what is happening in The Fountain. The Wrestler looks terrific though, looking forward to it.
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Read a theory on the fountain which made sense. I saw it at a test screening (prior to reading the theory) and it left me baffled. In a nutshell, the theory goes... The modern day section of the film is the only "real" part of the film. The Conquistador section is the book Weisz is writing, and the bubble in space section is the ending to the book that Jackman wrote after the wife died. I haven't seen it since the test screening and subsequently reading the theory. I will have to one day. Maybe it does make sense. It's one of those films that I really wanted to LOVE, because Aronofsky is genius and Requiem is the film I'll show my future kids just before they hit the "experimenting" age to scare the living fuck out of them, but it left me dazed and confused. But Aronofsky swung for the fences on that one, and even if it didn't quite work, I'd rather watch something as original as that, than all the Remake/Reboot/Sequel crap that’s coming out of Hollywood these days. (Yes, I'm aware Aronofsky is doing RoboCop, and i did die a little inside when I found out. *Solitary tear rolls down cheek*) As for The Wrestler. Can... Not... Wait!
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and it was definately Darrens best movie to date
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I suppose it's open to interpretation several different ways, but my take is similar to that one, droid. The only difference is that I think the ending Tommy writes is the one that concludes with the conquistador going to the tree and eating of it. The bubble space, Howie Mandel sequence is, I think, not a complete fiction, but rather a representation of the mind-space of Tommy after Izzy's death. It's the journey he has to undertake to even be capable of writing that ending that he gives Izzy's book. It's the visualization of his grief, his hope in science, and his slow acceptance to death and the beyond. It was daring of Aronofsky to portray it that way, but for my money, it's the best explanation of the film I can come up with. The bubble scene happens in the same "time-space" as the modern bit, but it isn't literally real in the same way that we think of that other section, but more real than Izzy's novel.
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Yes, that makes sense as well. Nice one. I think I'm going to have to go back and watch it again. I give him credit, Aranofsky has presented us with a challenging film. Cheers.
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hey dude. what's the release date on this and when are we going to get a fucking trailer already????
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the very underrated Year of the Dragon. One of my favorite films. srsly.
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not 100% happy he's doing the robo remake. perhaps he can do it justice. i did think the fountain was underrated. and PI is a gem.
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...that Aronofsky was a piece of shit but what a fine mind he has.
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...Not really a hard task that, is it?
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The the space bubble part is Tommy (part immortal through eating from the tree) taking the tree that has grown up around Weisz's body (which contained the life giving essence they created discovered) the nebular to recharge it. I'd say the conqustador part is real as well the idea of reincarnation being prevalent throughout.
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The middle section is real. The first section is a book and the last section is Jackman writing the book having been inspired by some of Izzy's words about the cosmos. Its really just a simple sweet story of a man dealing with his wife dying. Its not that hard.
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Perfect ending to a perfect movie.
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Do you actually read the fuckin reviews?
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Requiem For A Dream was silly and The Fountain was like the film equivalent of hanging out at a New Age bookstore. Pi was cool, but very derivative of Tetsuo The Iron Man.
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I'm dying to see this based on the advance buzz, but I've looked all over the internet and can't seem to find a trailer. I would think they would have at least cut a trailer by now unless they're completely stumped at how to market this film.
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that although this was unlike any of Darren Aronofsky's other films there were still a few of his 'trademarks' visible? Great point about Anderson by the way, and you're right this was a radical departure from Aronofsky's usual stuff but a couple of things stood out that he is known for: 1. Repetition: did you notice how many steadi-cam tracking shots there were of Rourke, following him from behind? I can't figure out why Aronofsky kept using this shot. Maybe to show that he fights other battles outside of the ring in his every day life? 2. The overall melancholy tone of the film: the day Aronofsky does a slapstick comedy (or for Anderson, a horror film - to use your example) is the day he makes a radical change from his themes. Outstanding review by the way and I complete agree. It really is that good. Looking forward to seeing
Synecdoche, New York next; hopefully this Sunday. -
but there are a few clues that Tommy is the same person in the present and future sequences. I'll watch it again tonight and come back with the little things that led me to believe it was a little different from your theory on it.
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...hotter now than she has ever been? My goodness.Thanks for the review Moriarty. I'd like to check this one out soon. And great comments on Rourke; interesting guy and career.
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Sorry. And thanks for the profanity. Much appreciated.
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I saw the film at TIFF and Aronofsky mentioned that because people are so pre-occupied with Roarke's face that he wanted to hold off on showing his face until the last possible second. That's why the opening begins with us following him from behind as he goes about his life. Great idea by Aronofsky and another example of how he is one of the best of using the camera to help the plot and tone of his films. Music video directors should take a page out of his book. It isn't about getting a cool shot it's about getting the most effective shot to evoke the desired emotion from the viewer.
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That really makes sense and resonates really well now that I think about it. Holy shit, can you believe what just happened here? Two talkbackers just had a legitimate discussion about film! I better bring us back down now: ass-hats gotta eat! shit dicknose fuckknob nuked the fridge then drinks a beer and cheets on his wife (etc.)
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Can we stop yapping about that awful Fountain movie and show Mr Rourke some love?I lost count of how many times my freinds and I would watch Rumble Fish, Year Of The Dragon and Angel Heart on videotape during the 80s. He also did a terrific (and hugely underrated) late 80s Walter Hill genre picture titled Johnny Handsome.
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Perhaps I should have enjoyed it more in a movie theatre. Watched it in HD on HBO and thought it was an utter mess. Is there a Fountain Director's Cut coming...'cause whenever I watch an 'important' film that has a 90 minute running time that it always makes me think I'm watching a post-test screening version.
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That first sentence should have said "Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more if I watched it at a movie theatre"
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Thanks for the review, Mori. I'm glad as hell to hear the film resonates so well. I'm happy Aronofsky cast Rourke in such an iconically human role. And Marisa Tomei too?
Can't wait to see this. -
And she does fantastic work. I couldn't agree with Moriarty more -- The Wrestler is a tremendous movie. I'm seeing it at the DGA again this weekend.
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He was at a sneak of a screening in Atlanta. After the Q & A's were over, I went to meet him, talk a bit. In the conversation, I mentioned that Requiem is the only film I've ever purchased sight-unseen. He was curious as to why. I told him so many people had advised about how good it is, that I did it. So, of course, he asked what I thought of it. I said "It was so damn depressing that I've seen it once, and it sits on my shelf now." He laughed at that, and understood. Very gracious about it all. I am very interested in this film, and will see it in theatres, to help with the money aspect so he (and the others in the film) can continue to make quality stuff for years to come.
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Every review has said it is a great film. I used to be an avid wrestling fan a few years ago and have even watched the Beyond the Mat documentary. This movie sounds like it's almost a semi-biography of Jake "The Snake" Roberts. Is this best movie of the year so far?
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one of my favorite movies easily, I love it and watch it often. I believe Darren has said that the bubble section of the film is actually the present. The modern day part are memory flashback from the bubble and the conquistador bits are from the book (and maybe having to do with reincarnation)
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The world is coming to an end! I'm glad to see him getting some screen time, I've heard he's a good guy. As a wrestling dork, I'm interested to see this movie, though it being actually fantastic certainly doesn't hurt either.
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...someone has a distinct style.
Hitchcock films look like Hitchcock.
Capra looks like Capra.
Welles always looks like Welles.
Chaplin, Fritz Lange etc. They all use various techniques and designs that repeat through out their repetition.
It's fine for a director to question and change up his/her style.
Just leave a director alone, if they've found something that works for them and tells their stories in the best possible formats.
Enough with this aesthetics backlash.
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Simply saying "i shall throw out all style" seems to be only a cheap and lazy method of developing a new one.
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I'm currently reading Bret Hart's autobiography and it's fascinating. Bret is very honest about the wrestling life style. How it's a brotherhood, that comes with fame, fortune, and a real sense of satisfaction by putting on a great show for the fans. However, the down side is huge. Most of these guys end up as bitter drug addicts, broke, and with their bodies wrecked. A good chunk of them die young. From what I've read this movie takes the same no bullshit point of view as Bret's book and that can only be a good thing.
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Probably my most aniticipated movie this year after The Good the Bad the Weird.
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enjoying a movie like that! Pfft.
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ROH ROH ROH
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It seems like you really missed the point of that final speech. The reason he doesn't give the rousing Macho Man speech is because that part of his life is over. And he knows it. For the first time, he's addressing his fans as himself. Not his persona.
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Aranofsky's not Kubrick. But it's a closer fit than comparing Boyle's Sunshine to 2001. Fountain is arguably the superior work.
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I'm a subscriber to the idea that only the present portion is "real." The conquistador section is Izzy's book, and the spacecraft section is an allegorical extension of the story, suggested by Izzy. It's how Tom "finishes it." All three plotlines essentially tell the same story, but in different ways. I think the idea that the space section should be taken literally, even if Aronofsky intended it that way, is, well, a bit silly. Plus if you watch the last shot of the film, Xibalba appears to go supernova while Present Tom is watching it (which of course implies that it actually went nova 500 years earlier), so it couldn't go nova again 500 years later, which calls the literal reality of that space section into further question.
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...but then they went and threw in a supervillain at the end. WTF?
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Pi was good, Requiem was great, I kinda like The Fountain although it was a great disappointment. I'm really pumped by all the positive buzz this film is creating... Need to hunt down a preview screening SOMEHOW!!!
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Pi was good for a first outing. Requiem felt brilliant when I was in high school but subsequently feels heavy handed. I still give it major ups for its creativity, but the story is kind of meh. The Fountain, I flat out hated. Hated the way it was shot and lit. Hated the obviousness of its themes despite it's attempt to veil itself in vagueness and ambiguity. In many ways, I hated The Fountain for the same reasons I hate Thomas Kincaid paintings. But I'm hoping The Wrestler marries the style he's been developing with character development. And it sounds like it has. Araonofsky appears to be growing up...
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I've been a big wrestling fan for over 20 years, so I'm very interested to see it! Rourke is great (he was Harley Davidson and Marv!), Tomei as a stripper mmmmmmmm... and some real wrestlers too? I'm sold! Just gimme a release date already!
Necro Butcher is one insane motherfucker, go look for some of his ultraviolent hardcore matches if you dare. I've heard an interview with him, and he sounds so nice and laidback, not what is expected when you see him getting stabbed with barbed wire and neon lighttubes! -
Was great. The only movie I ever watched over again the moment it was over.
The conquistador story was, I think, purely fiction, his wife's story. The present day segment was real; the future I'm not sure about, but lean towards it being Tom's way of ending of the story. Perhaps it's a representation of his emotional journey, showing his 'headspace'. I don't think reincarnation particularly plays a part. -
The way I see the Fountain is that it's three separate stories artificially blended into one to create a metaphor for the acceptance of death. Case in point - we see in the film the Izzie taking a seed-pod from the Tree of Life in the Conquistador storyline and giving it to Dr Tom in the "present" storyline. This makes absolutely zero literal sense, but if you take it as a metaphorical intersection, in which all three storylines reach their conclusions by the Tom character understanding the nature of death, it fits fine. I think you need to look at the film in a more "meta" way - the three storylines are basically about the quest to overcome death and the ultimate resolution that death is not something that needs to be overcome, because death is not the end and love conquers all yada yada yada. I actually think the themes of the film itself are kinda trite, but it's made so damn well, considering the corners that had to be cut because of the shoestring budget, that I admire it for that at the very least. I guess it's the same way I feel about Requiem - it's constructed so brilliantly that the shortcomings of the script kinda take a back seat.
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This sounds fantastic. Angel Heart was one of those movies we just had to find a way to see when we were 13 years old and Mickey just embodied a worldly cool that we all aspired to. Now that I am a semi broken down father of 2, it will be great to see old Mick out fighting the good fight against what life does to us.
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I confused logging in with a title, either that or I am just talking to myself again.
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I saw this back at the premier in Toronto and was blown away...I agree 100% with everything you said. I truly think it has one of the best endings/final shots of any movie Ive seen.
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Nov 07, 2008 10:55:32 PM CST
I agree with Mori not Black Crippler...Black Crippler you sound
by thedark0knight
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like a douche bag
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The one that was put out looks a rush-job, piece of shit transfer.
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But that's what we expect from BraneRobot / AnimalStructure / ThunderBalls = AICN's least favorite subhuman Mori stalker.
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This is the one film I'm sorry I missed there by not attending this year. I saw Mickey being interviewed on Graham Norton last week and it the film does look amazing.
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... everyone's entitled to their read. I think this is the opposite of something like MILLION DOLLAR BABY, where the fights and the outside the ring life were both written at such a blatant manipulative surface level that I never believed any of it. Everybody's acting their asses off, but none of it feels real.
THE WRESTLER's the opposite for me. I fully acknowledge that Aronofsky's working familiar ground here, and that seems to be the point. It's the specific choices he makes that turn the cliche into something honest and earned here. If you don't feel it, that's cool. I also think RUDY is fucking fantastic. Care to take some shots at the honesty of that ending, too? -
he actually did sack the qb in the game. as for the rest of the film..
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Nov 08, 2008 6:20:16 AM CST
It's about time there was a movie showing what wrestlers really
by mr nicholas
I really can't wait to see this.
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You people expect a movie to hungrily eat your asshole and then lovingly give you a reach around. The Wrestler is a movie by a guy who probably isn't making movies for you.
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Really? I mean, the movie's alright, and I certainly can't compare it to a movie I haven't seen (The Wrestler), but just from people's description of The Wrestler, it seems the only similarity between it and Rudy is both involve sports. And for the record, Rudy is pretty middle of the road for inspirational sports movies.
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I thought the movie was fairly self explanatory... the modern stuff and the space stuff are both "real." The conquistador stuff is the representation of the book that Izzy was writing, and it parallels the events in their life together, symbolically (that's an entirely different essay in it's own right). At the end of the modern events, Tommy discovers the "cure" to death... but only just too late to save Izzy. With death cured, Tommy lives such a long life that the tree he planted on his wife's grave (which now contains her spirit), is dying of old age. He sets out to take her to Shelbalba... literally.
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Agree completely with the review. The scene where Randy is working in the deli section and having fun with his job is just an absolute pleasure to watch. And, at the very least: naked Marissa Tomei...
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I loved the movie, but thought it would more or less come and go. But just seeing the excitement for it here is great. I'd love to see Rourke get an Oscar nomination for this.
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I have to say the constant use of the following shot of Mickey Rourke in the Wrestler bugged me but the movie was still good, just not great. And definitely not better than Requiem or The Fountain. You are insane for saying that Moriarty. I understand the hate for the Fountain. Either people did not understand the movie or people felt the movie used themes and ideas that are present in many other works by smarter people than Aronofsky. Fact to me is, The Fountain is his best work and the most emotional and beautiful film I have ever seen. The ideas of immortality and everlasting love and just the Mayan belief system was entirely new to me and I thank Aronofsky for bringing that to the mainstream even though he took ideas from someone else. Whoever exposes you to something first has the most effect on you, after all. As far as theories on the Fountain, the future storyline could be real or part of the book. Either case can be argued but I'd like to think it wasn't real. I'd like to think Tommy eventually accepted Izzi's death and understood that death is not the end but the road to awe and once he dies, together they will live forever. Fucking beautiful stuff, I love that film so so much.
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I'll see it just for Rourke, but it sounds like something more than just a tour de force comeback performance(thanks for clarifying that, Moriarty). Please don't let that Springsteen song over the closing credits be "Glory Days"(too schmaltzy, IMO). There's an interesting article in the Nov. 2nd issue of Entertainment Weekly about Rourke that is properly respectful, but fuckit if he didn't start breaking down in tears when the interviewer(Dr. Drew in disguise?)probed a bit deeper than perhaps he should have. That kind of frankness may have served the moment appropriately, but Roarke needs to deal with the fact that he was once his own worst enemy, and move on. It behooves him not to whine in a public forum. He may well snag a Best Actor nomination, but he won't win if he keeps up that nonsense.
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how're those meds treating you, buddy.
there was a shitton of honesty in the stripper and the daughter. maybe your life hasn't led you to have to deal with situations like that but they were just on. and why would "the old ram" be a good thing after everything that's come before it? if that speech in the ring isn't about his growth there's no movie.
why you have to call the reviewer names? is it because it's moriarty? do you think that strengthen's your argument? what's your endgame, that FOX is funnelling revenue into Harry's back pocket?
If so, you've not been paying attention these last 9 years, buddy. -
Curious on the inspiration...
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How come the art department is never mentioned in reviews. Films look good or bad based on the dp and what the has to work with visually. Sets do not magically appear. The art Dept. is usually the largest dept on a film. Time to give the "Art" dept a little cred. Films are generally considered "art".
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No. It is a very good one, though. A good one, indeed.
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