The Wrestler (with optional Pi Prelude)

Darren Aronofsky’s 1998 film, Pi, scared and disturbed me. So much so that I avoided seeing his 2000 film, Requiem for a Dream, and why I figured I’d pass on his new film, The Wrestler. But the preview seemed engaging and my daughter Ania liked it, so I girded my loins and gave it a try.

FIRST, ABOUT Pi (or skip down a few #'s to the comments on The Wrestler)
The story is about the obsessive, constantly ramped-up quest of a computer whiz to find God in the numerology of the Torah. Maximillian Cohen, the film’s whiz, is not your typical seeker of truth. He acts like he’s locked in a grudge match with infinity. Most of the movie is about him ratcheting up his computing power to crack through the mysterious membrane that separates human beings from understanding the universe. Dozens of razor sharp jump cuts and ultra-close ups later, Cohen actually plants an advanced chip in his head. And thus are Icarus’ cyberbrains fried and he ends up living in a human body with a different form of intelligence ... which is where The Wrestler begins, more or less.

DISCLOSURE
As a recovering seeker of ultimate knowledge, I have answered the call to go beyond the biological senses to a more meaningful dimension of experience. Pi reminded me how self-referential such a quest can be, and how far out one can get. At the same time, being in this zone was arguably the most exciting time of my life. Everything that happened (or didn’t) resonated with several simultaneous levels of meaning. The world rippled when I moved. Pi, I feared, had the power to awaken my mystical yearnings from their slumbers, and I secretly want that to happen on Monday, Wednesdays and Fridays after 3:30 in the PM, unless it's a good day for golf.

ARONOFSKY
He's David Lynch edgy, Kubric vivid with a pinch of Werner Herzog Gotterdamerung. Pi was arguably the most intensely exhilarating and bruising cinematic experience I have ever had, or want to have.

THE WRESTLER
Mickey Rourke plays Randy “The Ram” Robinson, a 50-something professional wrestler still the king of the ring after all these years. Wrestling is his one and only calling and the arena, where men smash knees into each other's groins, is the one place on earth where he feels truly loved. Go figure.

Unlike the weaselly, hyper-cerebral Max (the Pi guy mentioned above), Randy is robust, calm and fundamentally likable. Even though he’s something of a golden oldie on the wrestling circuit, he never lords it over his fellow actor-athletes. Neither does he back down from the physical abuse inflicted by guys half his age, even when it involves having staples shot at close range into chest, face and back. Randy sometimes ramps up the drama by inflicting bloody wounds on himself.

Some of this is not pretty to watch but The Ram maintains a certain dignity in wrestling’s crude circus ecosystem. He never seems to tire of his scripted triumphs over sadistic, death to America-spouting giants wearing Osama Bin Ladin get-ups. That’s partly because he always wins, and who doesn't like that. It's also partly that he’s cast as a hero in an era sorely lacking in same, and that he has the privilege of acting out our collective need for the simple justice that’s been missing from contemporary society for some time now.

But Randy’s real triumph, pushing 60 years of age, is still being in the game at all. His battle royale is against the demons of aging and decrepitude which have long ago sent his peers into rehab or car sales. His quest is to stay forever young and vital; the body yearns for immortality as the mind yearns for God.

ANOTHER DISCLOSURE
I identify with not knowing when to quit, having recently started playing in a softball league after three decades out of the game. It’s very cool to be reawakening muscle memory from my youth and playing a game I once truly loved. I find myself talking a lot about my softball adventures to friends and strangers alike. I am surprised that I can still play the game and at times I must sound (ugh) a little boastful to be 60 and still mixing it up credibly with guys in their 20’s. No very serious injuries so far (but basketball is another story we’ll save for another time). I regret having missed so many seasons of team sports joy, but then I was never a joiner of teams, clubs or organizations or someone who found enjoyment in them when I was involved. I have always loved being a player but I lack the gene for being a comfortable, integral part of groups. Perhaps like Randy the Ram ...

CLOSING THOUGHTS ON THE WRESTLER
Even fake wrestling is a bruising impact sport, pro football without pads of any kind and with ordinary objects like chairs and staple guns turned into weapons. Randy stays in the game thanks to a very high pain threshold and a rainbow coalition of steroids, pain killers and uppers. He sacrifices everything to stay in wrestling, including his health and his relationship with his daughter and former wife. Feeling mortality closing in on him, he makes a long over due and touching but bungled attempt to reconnect with his estranged daughter. And he almost connects with an aging stripper/hooker (played by an earnest and still appealing Marissa Tomei) who is also looking for a way out of her own addiction to using her body to get love from strangers. There seems to be some shared spark between them, these two good-hearted, used-up performers, knowing it’s time for a second act but not quite sure they have what it takes to live off stage as themselves.