The Wrestler is a very depressing film. It has the great ability to pound you over the head with sadness and loss, give you some vague sense of happyness or hope that something is finally going right, then it comes right back and rapes all your hopes of happyness with a long and drawn out sequence of mind numbing depression. After a while I became almost indifferent to the film. There are many instances where the film shows that the glory days will not last forever, that all heroes are regular people in the end and that we are all human.

Weakness it seems is what the film specializes in, Micky Rourke's character is shown getting beaten,regected, injected in the ass, stabbed, stappled and after a while you realize that this poor guy only finds happiness in his job. He has no family, his friends are as washed up as he is, and his love life consists of a one night stand with a very loud girl, and a pole dancer played by the lovely Marisa Tomei. Overall I would not call The Wrestler a great film, it is the kind of film that has many drawn out sequences that seemingly waste alot of time and though they dont waste time they dont usually amount to much. Mickey Rourke's performance is indeed great. I would call it the dark and depressing version of every sports cliche you have ever known. Prepare to have your dreams shattered, I hope you find the experience more interesting than I did. Wrestling fans, if there are any left, might appreciate this film. I am an old fan of wrestling when I was a kid so I found parts of the film very engaging

Overall I give it a 7.5 out of 10.