WARRIOR Post-Release Thread - Page 2

I think Gabe's mostly right. I've heard some MMA fans say they enjoyed it but I've also heard plenty of MMA fans dismiss the trailer as overly earnestly cheesy. I really think the name of the film and the "They're brothers!" trailer turned a lot of people off whether they're MMA fans or not.

Maybe I'm wrong about this in terms of the country as a whole, but in my area the awareness for this was practically non-existent.  I just don't think they put enough effort into promoting it.  Also, many of the people that knew of the movie didn't even know it had come out yet and most missed the chance to catch it because it was swept away within about 2 weeks of debuting.

Basically, I think September was a bad month to release it and the ball was definitely fumbled in the advertising department.............at least around here.

Finally saw it this afternoon in a pretty damn empty theater.  Everything has pretty much been said at this point (man, I hate staggered release dates!), so I'll sum it up right quick -

As an advertisement for MMA, it's absolutely fucking reprehensible.  If that was my first exposure to the sport, I would have absolutely no interest in learning more about it (just as a frame of reference, I've trained and done MMA for sevenl years, as well as freestyle and pro wrestling for the past decade or so . . . yeah yeah, I'm a real badass).  I can only imagine that people who know nothing about the sport would see this film and think "Yep, human cockfighting - just as I thought". 

As a FILM, however?  Worked like gangbusters.  Loved it.  Instant classic.  Could easily go back and watch it again tonight.  Sure it coasts on a few cliches, but name me a sports film that doesn't.  There were some incredibly heartbreaking moments in there.  Put me in with those who enjoyed it far more than The Fighter.

This movie has inspired MONTHS of valuable work out fantasy fluff for me :)

For the life of me, I can't understand why this movie hasn't generated the amount of heat it deserves. It's moving, it's exciting, it's about a sport that's seems to be pretty hot right now. The actors act the shit out of their roles. The fights are great. It makes no sense. I guess the Tapout wearing douchebags got scared of the touchy feely stuff and the art-house crowd got turned of by all the MMA stuff. Shame.

It would make for an awesome double feature with Redbelt, though.

I'm going to pimp the shit out of this movie to my friends & family as soon as it hits home video.

Dec. 16th I think!

Also, between this and Bronson I'm convinced that Hardy will rock the shit out of Bane. Physically intimidating as fuck.

Based on what I saw in this film, I would not blink at all if Bane were to kill Batman with one punch.  

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Originally Posted by stelios 

Also, between this and Bronson I'm convinced that Hardy will rock the shit out of Bane and Mad Max. Physically intimidating as fuck.

Fixed that for you.

Don't jinx Mad Max man. If we stop mentioning it maybe it will start filming. 

April can't get here soon enough!

Quote:

Originally Posted by stelios 

Also, between this and Bronson I'm convinced that Hardy will rock the shit out of Bane. Physically intimidating as fuck.

His performance in the trailer for the Reese Witherspoon rom-com didn't already have you thoroughly convinced?

Finally got around to it last night. Bullshit that this one underperformed, and double bullshit that some people are bound to hate on it. It has its share of cloying moments (that scene where the kids are begging the principal to watch their teacher haul ass is straight out of an episode of Saved by the Bell or Family Matters), yes, but other than that, the thing aims for the stars and achieves it. As expected, Nick Nolte deserves an Oscar nomination at the very least for what he does here. The fight scenes have a superb energy and they're choreographed beautifully. No way Nolan didn't see an early cut of this before he decided on Tom Hardy as Bane because, as the film suggests, he becomes a YouTube phenomenon from beating the ever-loving shit out of people. Think 80's or 90's Gary Oldman if he could tap you on the larynx and automatically make you sound like a robot.

This is, I believe, the first real thing I've seen Joel Edgerton do, and my immediate assumption was that he's basically Sam Worthington's older brother who constantly kicked his ass when they were growing up, hence why this guy is awesome and Worthington doesn't match up to his brother.

Love the ending too. Perfect. If The Fighter was the new Raging Bull, then this could certainly be the new Rocky.

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Originally Posted by HunterTarantino 

If The Fighter was the new Raging Bull, then this could certainly be the new Rocky.

Sir, I've seen Raging Bull, The Fighter is no Raging Bull.

For me, it's as simple as this. Cliches are cliches because they contain a kernel of emotional truth that is universal. If a story can tap into that emotional truth, it can rock all the cliches it wants to.

This movie tapped into that in spades. Loved it.

A lot of the people I tried to convince to see this movie at the theater have gotten around to the DVD and are now griping that they wish they had seen it at the theater.

I don't think a movie has ever had this large a gap between my expectations (pretty low) and my final assessment (Super high). I really wish one of the leads could have gotten a major nomination out of this.

As somebody into martial arts, but finds MMA such a fucking annoying sports movement in general? I loved this movie more than I could have thought possible.

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Originally Posted by LaurenOrtega 

As somebody into martial arts, but finds MMA such a fucking annoying sports movement in general?

Is that because of the meathead fanbase stereotype Lauren? Or are you just a purist?

It's the meatheads, and it's goddamn terrible down here in Nashville. I'm not exactly some daisy when it comes to martial arts(I did boxing for a while) and have at least some familarity with the bullshit, and machismo that comes with those things. But every single hardcore MMA guy I've known has just been a big redneck piece of shit.

Unfortunately, UFC seems to attract all the kids who've outgrown WWE and are looking for something a little more realistic.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JacknifeJohnny 

Sir, I've seen Raging Bull, The Fighter is no Raging Bull.

Theoretically speaking.

I know I'm a bit late to this party but, my God, this was a great movie. And I knew nothing about MMA before watching this.

It's amazing how well it makes that fighting format cinematic without really doing the hyper-choreographed bullshit like they do in football or even most boxing movies. Most of the fights ultimately come down to two dudes wriggling on the floor as it does in real life, and yet by the means of sheer filmmaking it remains consistently spectacular to watch.

It's because you can see Edgerton's face STRAAAAAAAAINING for dear life!

Lots of fight/action sequences in movies forget that human element.  A med-to-close shot of a character's face does wonders for me.

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Originally Posted by Renn Brown 

It's amazing how well it makes that fighting format cinematic without really doing the hyper-choreographed bullshit like they do in football or even most boxing movies. Most of the fights ultimately come down to two dudes wriggling on the floor as it does in real life, and yet by the means of sheer filmmaking it remains consistently spectacular to watch.

When you're given a reason to give an emotional shit about at least one of the people in that ring, you don't need flashy bullshit to hide the emptiness.

Yeah, during that Koba fight when Brendan has Koba in the lock and you can literally see him straining every muscle in his body to the point that he's turning red, and his trainer is screaming "Break it!  Break it!  BREEEEAK ITTTT!"

Pretty god damn awesome movie moment.

I was lucky enough to catch this in a theater during a double feature with Drive a couple weeks back, after missing both of them during their initial run.  And while Drive definitely stuck with me, I was really happy they ended this one.  It's usually a bit of a struggle for me to get through the second movie in these double features, but not this time.  The movie just works - great characters, engaging story.  There may be a few cliches, but when they're used to create something this emotionally moving I definitely don't care.  My only nitpick was that I wish they'd had Tom Hardy going up against Koba leading up to the final fight.  Wouldn't have stretched the credulity of the final win quite so much.  It's a small problem, though.  And the cast knocked it out of the park.  Nolte in particular was heartbreaking.

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Originally Posted by LaurenOrtega 

It's the meatheads, and it's goddamn terrible down here in Nashville. I'm not exactly some daisy when it comes to martial arts (I did boxing for a while) and have at least some familarity with the bullshit, and machismo that comes with those things. But every single hardcore MMA guy I've known has just been a big redneck piece of shit.

Yeah, that's a bummer but I totally get you. Even within MMA fan circles there are a lot of people who get pissed off or embarrassed by that imbecilic branch of the fanbase and the general Ed Hardy-esque tackiness that goes along with them. It seems like it turns a lot of non-fans off at least as much as the fighting does but I don't see it changing in a hurry.

There are a lot of genuinely cool and humble people both in the sport and supporting it (check out the current heavyweight champ Junior Do Santos, the nicest badass you'll ever get to see) but if you're in a part of the world which is riddled with douche it'd be real hard to give enough of a shit to give it a second look.

I gotta say kudos to Warrior for introducing me to Frank Grillo. I've actually seen him in plenty of stuff before, but he's ALWAYS seemed like a non-professional, and just the actual cop/tough guy/bruiser that they found in a gym somewhere. In "Warrior" I spent the longest time thinking that this 80's-porn-looking dude with the genuine NY accent was actually just the owner of the gym and they liked the flair and honesty he brought to the role. Now I pretty much think every movie should be FRANK GRILLOIZED. He's also great in a more conventional sense in the upcoming "The Grey." Big Grillo fan now.

I really dug Grillo in the film as well.  He (along with Noah Emmerich) seems to be a Gavin O'Connor regular.

Yeah, his character in this was pretty much the best friend a guy could ever wish for.

I'm a reedy Jew pacifist pussy-willow conditioned to loathe MMA through a long association with lunkheaded bros, and I still liked this movie quite a bit, which has to count for something. Hardy, Edgerton, and Nolte are all absolutely fantabulous.

That being said, the long-ass series of fights began to wear on me at times, the movie never knows when to get out of its own way and stop laying it all on so goddamn thick (An adorable daughter with a heart condition? Really?). Also Mulder is completely on the money with Jennifer Morrison's character; but then, I'm completely done with the "killjoy, unsupportive wife" archetype, which is so laughably, transparently misogynistic.

The adorable daughter with a heart condition thing would've bugged me if the movie had actually done anything with it, such as cutting away to her watching Edgerton fight on TV while sick in bed.  Since the movie didn't do that, I could discount it pretty easily as mere background info. 

I barely remember what the daughters look like.  They show up in the movie for a couple minutes at most.  The movie's manipulative for sure, but it doesn't go as far as people say it does.  They really should've dropped the stuff with the principal and the students.  Those scenes were just weird.

See seemingly every single cop-related film or television show ever.

I've been involved enough in martial arts off and on(a bit of boxing, Muay Thai, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Kali, and Silat if anybody needs to know) and have seen way too many people of all different types to ever really rule out a whole bunch of people. I think there's honestly some good guys doing MMA stuff, I just happen to live in a place where the fucking hillbillies all flocked towards it.

That and martial arts in general breeds arrogant assholes. I'll take a dozen of the worst 'roided up meatheads over the average Taekwondo teacher in the Nashville area.

If you want to be done with that archetype, you need to be done with the dumb husband archetype too.  Then we have nothing!  NOTHING!

And the fucking Ayatollah can walk right into your house and tell you what to do!

Has there ever been a thoroughly dumb, complacently supportive husband in movie history? One that isn't just played for laughs in a comedy, of course, or used as a quasi-villain or rival when our hero is an aging divorced man down on his luck. The into-the-background melting husband dude in War of the Worlds, for an e.g.

Maya Rudolph's fiance in Bridesmaids was barely there.  But he left no impression whatsoever, it doesn't count.

So why did I bring it up?

HMM?

How did The Devil Wears Prada treat Anne Hathaway's boyfriend character (Vince Chase from Entourage)?  Wasn't he just supportive in the background?  

Letters to Juliet had Gael Garcia Bernal as an aloof fiance who has no problem with Amanda Seyfried going around on her adventures.  But then, that character is portrayed as the most clueless doofus.  I don't even think there was any fallout from learning that his fiance was into someone else.

Heheh. John Carrol Lynch in Fargo was all that needed to be said.

Although I would say the naivety and lunk-headedness of that character is part of the point. I mean, I'm sure the Coens intended for him to be an almost angelically innocent embodiment of the idea of family, to a degree where it becomes funny while also being an isolated, miniscule source of hope in an otherwise hopeless film. The Coens are writers who don't deploy cliches unless they're totally aware of them and want to use them to a certain end. But yeah -- that's a whole other thread. The generic boyfriend is totally more of an archetype than what my knee-jerk reaction suggested.

But even then, the Generic Boyfriend is marked by vacuousness and lack of personality, which is only lazy at worst. In contrast, there's reams of negative subtext in the Shrill Unsupportive Wife.

Yep. And typically the implications of the Generic Boyfriend are mitigated by the presence of other more thoroughly-drawn, complex, non-cliche men in most films. Fargo for instance offers a number of alternate male characters. Warrior offers no other female characters beyond its Nagging but Ultimately Supportive Wife.

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Originally Posted by LaurenOrtega 

That and martial arts in general breeds arrogant assholes.

Honestly I've always found the opposite, which is why I figured it was a part-of-the-world thing. Generally nothing breeds humility in a 235lb gorilla faster than being tied in knots by a 135lb spider monkey. That's what bjj is all about.

And when you look at the people at the top of this sport there is a mix of the arrogant and the humble. For every Chael Sonnen there's a Junior Dos Santos. For every Rashad Evans there's a Shogun Rua. For every Brock Lasnar there's a Cain Velasquez. For every Ronda Rousey there's a Gina Carrano. In fact, the majority of people who compete professionally are cool, respectful, generous and humble people.

OK, someone explain to me like I'm five why the "unsupporting wife" character is misogynistic. Because watching this movie, actually, I happened to switch genres between Morisson and Edgerton and have her into a profession where she comes home from work every week beaten up. Ended up in hospital even. And Edgerton's character would react in the exact same way her's did as would any actual human being. Where's the misogyny inherent in the character?

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Originally Posted by stelios 

OK, someone explain to me like I'm five why the "unsupporting wife" character is misogynistic. Because watching this movie, actually, I happened to switch genres between Morisson and Edgerton and have her into a profession where she comes home from work every week beaten up. Ended up in hospital even. And Edgerton's character would react in the exact same way her's did as would any actual human being. Where's the misogyny inherent in the character?

Agreed and I was going to ask a similar question actually. The wife is given quite a few very legitimate reasons not to be cool with her husband getting punched in the face repeatedly again - especially considering how he'd left his career the last time.

I don't think there's anything particularly misogynistic about Morrison's character in particular to this film.  It's more that we just see it all the damned time.  She's not much of a character.  Just a plot element. 

I think Morrison does what she can with the material to make it relatable.  She is reacting to her husband's situation exactly how you'd think a real person would.  She doesn't come across as shrill or nagging.

But such a role often does come across that way when the filmmakers don't treat it as anything more than a hindrance to the male hero character.  So such a trend can be seen as misogynistic, but I don't think Morrison's character was handled badly.  It was serviceable without embarrassing itself.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mcnooj82 

I don't think there's anything particularly misogynistic about Morrison's character in particular to this film.  It's more that we just see it all the damned time.  She's not much of a character.  Just a plot element. 

 

I think Morrison does what she can with the material to make it relatable.  She is reacting to her husband's situation exactly how you'd think a real person would.  She doesn't come across as shrill or nagging.

 

But such a role often does come across that way when the filmmakers don't treat it as anything more than a hindrance to the male hero character.  So such a trend can be seen as misogynistic, but I don't think Morrison's character was handled badly.  It was serviceable without embarrassing itself.

Exactly. The Hangover this was not.

I also found the wife believable in this film and wouldn't call her a nag as much as a realist. Who wouldn't feel the same way about their old-ass spouse (by sporting standards) entering a young man's tournament to face certain injury/possible death?

I think the cliche count could have been reduced a bit by having Koba just be American. I didn't see any reason why he had to be Russian. Just having him be the best in the U.S. would have seemed formidable enough since it was already established that Brendan was past his prime and the obvious underdog. Plus, I already said this before, but I would have loved to see Tommy fight Koba, prior to losing to Brendan to up the believability factor.

Koba was Russian because he mirrors Fedor Emelianenko. 

I loved this movie. Such a great story.