Beaten by life but not broken by it, Mickey Rourke delivers the performance of his career in "The Wrestler." Better believe all that Rourke Oscar buzz.
Mickey Rourke may no longer be the smoking hot hunk that made women weak in the knees in the 1986 romance "Nine � Weeks." But talk about a comeback.
Just like Randy "the Ram" Robinson, the washed-up character he plays in "The Wrestler," Rourke's return from has-been land is a knockout.
Just ask Adrien Brody. "I haven't seen many films at the festival but I did see 'The Wrestler.' Mickey is amazing. His work blew me away," the actor told CTV during the Toronto International Film Festival.
Thanks to director Darren Aronofsky ("The Fountain") Rourke appears on screen like some mottled, puffy bull who is at least 20 years past his prime. He's penniless and without friends at the film's outset, although kids still seem impressed by his dusty, tough-guy history.
Other than a few moments of connection with an aging stripper (Marisa Tomei) and some boozed-up dudes at a gentleman's club this blonde-haired hulk who lugs cartons at a big-box store is left with nothing much to contemplate about life other than death.
"You ought to see "The Passion of the Christ," stripper Tomei tells him. "They threw everything at him." It's a statement that compels "the Ram" to consider Jesus one "tough dude."
Rourke delivers plenty of black humour as he tries to reconnect with his estranged daughter (Evan Rachel Wood) and give his "relationship" with Tomei's character more permanence. He even tries to find some kind of normalcy in his life by working at a deli counter. The stint leaves him as cold as the slabs of beef in the cooler.
Ultimately it's the call of the ring that lures this aging outcast on. Stepping out of retirement "the Ram" signs on for a 20th anniversary rematch against the Ayatollah, one of his legendary opponents from his glory days. The fight that follows is as far removed from "Rocky" pomp and syrup as Dakota Fanning is from a bottle of Jack Daniels.
"The Ram" doesn't ask for our sympathy. Neither does Rourke. There he stands before us, his nipped-and-tucked mug battered by life. Rourke pours out all that he is -- and is not -- in every look, gesture and word, delivering not merely an Oscar-worthy performance but one of the greatest screen moments Hollywood has seen.
At 51 Rourke, like the character he plays, may no longer be young and beautiful. But if ever there was truth to the saying that age counts before beauty this comeback kid proves it in "The Wrestler."
