WARRIOR

Some movies teach a lesson, while others merely let us learn the lesson, and, sometimes, learn it the hard way. I’m not a fight fan, but had read good reviews for the movie Warrior, so spent this afternoon sharing a big tub of buttered movie popcorn with my movie buddy and a sprinkling of other viewers. Good decision: good film. Nick Nolte deserves at least an Oscar nomination, if not the award, for his portrayal of a father estranged from his son’s lives, sons who do not forget nor forgive.

Brothers brought up the hard way learned to fight for their lives against an alcoholic father, Nolte, who uses all of his personal history to become Paddy, the Drunk Daddy. Physical abuse, psychological abuse, spousal abuse – the family shared it all, culminating in a split between brothers, as well as husband and wife. Years later, everyone has physically moved on, including Paddy, who celebrates 1000 days of sobriety, to which his sons respond that it doesn’t change the thousands of days they spent with him while he was drunk. Shit happens for all of us, but what we do with it makes the difference between tossing it in the trash or hiding it in a paper bag and lighting the bag on fire: someone still has to deal with it.

Tommy joins the Marines and goes to war, a continuation of his childhood lifestyle. He knows how to fight, and he fights to win, but he has no idea how to become himself. Brenden is a former fighter-turned-physics teacher, who marries the love of his life, fathers two little girls, and faces the potential loss of his home through foreclosure. When Brenden turns to fighting at parking lot matches to earn extra money to get current on the bills, he is suspended without pay from his teaching job, which leaves him with few alternatives except what he knows all too well: more fighting. The brother’s personal battles become public when they face-off for a $5 million purse in a Mixed Martial Arts event called The War at the [Jersey] Shore. The odds against them are what they have already faced throughout their lives, insurmountable, but they begin with “let’s do this” and end with a win neither expects.

The story is outstanding; it is well-cast (Nick Nolte, Tom Hardy, Joel Edgerton), totally believable, and flat-out engrossing. It may be another "Rocky" fight story, but it’s a great fight story! Interwoven is the battle between Captain Ahab and Moby Dick, but that is nuance the majority of audiences will not understand. The primary distraction to enjoying the film is that it is shot with a hand-held camera, a technique that makes those of us with vertigo slightly nauseous. At times, I shut my eyes or looked away from the screen as the camera zoomed in and out, in and out randomly, while moving side-to-side, as well as up and down throughout the scene. I longed for the good old days, when the cameras were fixed in position, rather than being part of the action of each scene.

This is a “must see” movie on my list this year, and since it’s already September and I have no other movies with that rating, it must also be outstanding.