Full disclosure: professional wrestling drives me crazy. But movies about professional wrestling? That’s another history. The iron claw (now streaming on Maxplus VOD services like Amazon Prime Video) takes the prestige drama route by dramatizing the story of the Von Erich brothers, real-life wrestlers beset by so much tragedy, which not only inspired conversations about a “Von Erich curse , But it also didn’t all fit into one movie (one of the six brothers is eliminated entirely, so that the movie doesn’t become unwieldy).Martha Marcy May Marlene, El Nido) writes and directs, with a cast led by Jeremy Allen White (Bear), now in the full bloom of his career, and Zac Efron, whose improved physique and hideous bowl cut put him one coat of green paint away from being the former TV version of the Incredible Hulk. Don’t take this as a warning, though: Efron was 100 percent screwed out of an Oscar nomination for playing a hunk of muscle who finally, after a lifetime of suffering, learns that it’s okay to be “real.” men†to cry.
THE IRON CLAW: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
The essence: Fritz Von Erich (Holt McCallany) is a scoundrel. That’s wrestling slang for “villain,” if you don’t know. He jumps into the ring to a hail of boos and makes the good guys suffer with the Iron Claw, a signature move in which he violently grabs his opponent’s skull and squeezes. We meet him around 1960, when he, his easygoing (at best?) wife Doris (Maura Tierney), and his two young children were living in a motor home, touring the wrestling circuit. He dedicated his life to making wrestling an important career, but he never really made the big moment. He never won a championship belt.
By 1979, Fritz is practically done with the ring and has taken up residence on a farm in Dallas, where the garage is filled with weightlifting equipment and the driveway features a full-size wrestling ring. He runs the Sportatorium, where he presents his sons in bouts in front of frenzied fans and ESPN viewers in the early days of cable. Kevin (Efron) is the star for now, and Fritz prepares him for a heavyweight title fight. David (Harris Dickinson) is Kevin’s tag team partner and is good at talking shit on camera, one of pro wrestling’s entertainment skills outside of the wild physical feats. Kerry (White) is an Olympic hopeful, though his dream is derailed when President Carter boycotts the 1980 Moscow games. And Mike (Stanley Simons) is the youngest, and he doesn’t look like he bench presses with Frigidaires; He would rather be a musician, and that’s why, when Fritz sorts out his children, Mike always appears. last.
Yes, he ranks his kids, just like Deion Sanders. The list is at least fluid. You might think that this could seriously toxify sibling relationships, but you could also argue that it only makes them closer. They do everything together, whether it’s training, working on the property, or drinking beer at a party. Two scenes illustrate the tone of his relationship with his parents: in one, Kevin asks his mother if they can talk about something, and she coldly replies, “That’s what your brothers are for.” In the other, Fritz. He interrupts the boys while they are putting up a fence, takes Kerry aside and tells him, since his Olympic dream is ruined, that now he too will be a wrestler. To say that Kerry is honored by this quasi-anointing is no exaggeration; In the Von Erich house, wrestling is religion. So we get a series of opening shots that show us a cabinet full of trophies, a cabinet full of weapons, a crucifix, and a somber family portrait in which no one is smiling. Only game faces. That’s how it works around here. You stiffen your way through life and that’s it.
I can hear you doing math: we know the sixth brother didn’t make the cut, but what about the fifth? He was the firstborn, but he died young, when Kevin was five years old. That makes Kevin the de facto oldest, although he never will be. the oldest, if that makes sense. We learn this during a tender moment: Kevin is on his first date with Pam (Lily James), who, upon hearing this tragic anecdote, gives him a long, sweet, nurturing hug. He explains to her how scripts are written for wrestling matches, but you can advance to bigger matches by proving yourself physically and as a performer. (Let’s be real: us non-wrestling fans needed to hear that too.) He also shares that his real last name is Adkisson, but they have all adopted his father’s stage name. €“and now he worries that his family is cursed for it. He believes that’s the reason Jack Jr. died. “I don’t believe in curses,” Pam replies. And that’s why she stays with him.
Mike drops Rush’s “Tom Sawyer” on the record player and time speeds up as Kevin, Kerry and David triple-team their way to national wrestling fame. They take bus trips across the country to go to games. They have a lot of fun, especially Kerry, who does cocaine, kegs and steroids. They shave their legs backstage. Fritz gives them lessons on how to tear phone books in half and, of course, how to manage the Iron Claw. One night in the locker room, Fritz comes in and says that David has earned the right to fight Ric Flair in Japan for the championship belt, the championship belt that Fritz could never get, mind you. At Pam and Kevin’s wedding reception, Kevin walks into the bathroom and hears someone getting sick in the stall. It’s David. He is vomiting blood. He is also scheduled to travel to Tokyo next week. This is where Von Erich’s curse awakens. And all Kevin can do is despair.
What movies will it remind you of?: The fighter is an obvious touchstone; Efron’s physical transformation echoes that of De Niro in raging bull; and although it is about wrestling not fake, fox hunter exists in the same stage of obsessed/dysfunctional character.
Performance worth seeing: Efron is remarkable, bordering on simply great as an inarticulate, sensitive man who seems as trapped in his family as he is in his sausage-overloaded body. “Soothing” is the perfect description for Efron’s work; Did we know he had it in him?
Memorable dialogue: Another great first date moment:
Pam: What do you want out of life, Kevin Von Erich?
Kevin: More ribs?
Sex and skin: A brief scene in which we don’t see much that the MPAA would label as “sexual situations.”
Our opinion: “Just by being together, we can do anything.” Kevin’s assessment of life with his brothers is serious and true, and his expression is even more heartbreaking when the brotherhood is torn apart by literal death and dismemberment. The iron claw is a heartbreaking American tragedy, a dramatic portrait of a family whose state of perpetual emotional denial prepared them for great hardship. There is no simple, easy summary of the Von Erich dynamic, although it seems defined primarily by Fritz’s pursuit of a masculine ideal, while Doris remains inert, outnumbered, and possibly overwhelmed. The most compelling element of this dynamic is rooted in professional wrestling itself, with Fritz obsessed with “winning” in a “sport” that is technically not a sport and therefore not subject to statistical claims of victory. The goal is a nebulous glory, and the path to it, though violent to both body and mind, is equally nebulous, and that makes equating wrestling with religion all the more poignant.
Parenting proves to be a powerful force in this story, and Fritz bequeaths his entertainment business mentality to his children that must continue. When one of them dies, he does not cry, nor does he share his feelings, he does not even cry; he simply elevates another son to the center ring. It’s the reality of sports, where a gruesome injury causes a brief pause before the coach brings in the substitute player so the game can continue. However, when it comes to the human psyche, this approach is deeply dysfunctional. The Von Erichs do not process their emotions (after death or simply losing an opportunity to climb a rung on the professional wrestling ladder) and curdle into thoughts of hopelessness and suicide.
At the beginning of the film, before the catastrophe begins to grow, Kevin feels it. His attempts to speak clearly about his feelings are repressed at home, but are accepted by Pam, who is the silent catalyst for his change. She is not as reckless as his brothers, not only because she has a wife and children to take care of, but because little by little she also begins to recognize how human psychology works. He has a certain degree of mental density to overcome, but it works in the end; He compares her to his siblings, who refuse to acknowledge his physical and psychological limitations for fear of disappointing his father. His father, again, who classifies them as only a badass would: his father, who is the villain of this film, although whether he is truly corrupt or evil is open to interpretation.
Once again, that is the central irony of the story: Fritz has used fear and love to unite his children indelibly. But for what reason? If you’re like Pam and don’t believe in curses, then Von Erich’s “curse” is of this earth. Artificial. Handmade inadvertently by a father who cannot see beyond his poisoned vision. Apparently, the Iron Claw is effective both inside and outside the ring. Kevin believes in Von Erich’s curse, but does he realize that belief is precisely what keeps her alive? The iron claw he wisely doesn’t give a clear answer as to why the Von Erichs, or humans in general, must suffer. It concludes with scenes of equally profound spirituality and pragmatism, both of which will completely rip your heart out.
Our call: Absorbing and disturbing, and with a professional performance by Efron, The iron claw is one of the best movies of 2023. STREAM IT.
John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic living in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
