The first thing to admire about the new movie “The Iron Claw” is the months of working out and diet suppliments necessary for the two lead actors in this film Zac Efron who plays Kevin Von Erich and Jeremy Allen White who plays Kerry Von Erich to get into such massive physical shape. Hopefully none of this muscular growth was achieved using steriods.
As an in-demand actor, very often there is a good deal of hardship to endure including months of shooting in a bad location and physical endurance to make the movie. The problem with achieving extreme body change to act in a film is that once the movie is over, you have to get back to normal physical shape. If you have to gain or lose a great deal of weight, very often this can mean long-term damage to the body. Extreme examples of this include Robert De Niro in “Raging Bull”, 1980, and Christian Bale in “The Machinist”, 2004 – arguably the most extreme body transformation in movie history.
This movie is about the ridiculous sport of professional wrestling, which is popular only in certain parts of the United States – even though everything that happens in the ring, is so obviously fake. The professional wrestling moves where one wrestler hits another wrestler in the head while stomping his foot, the throwing the other wrestler to the other end of the ring into the ropes have all been done for decades, and yet this continues to be an entertainment that makes money.
The subject of this movie is the Von Erich family who is one of the most popular wrestling families in history. This family traveled around the middle parts of the United States to small wrestling arenas for decades, trying to earn a living within an insane sport, that is all about fakery.
This is a depressing movie in every way, starting with the main reason why this entire family was cursed, the father of the four brothers Fritz Von Erich, played by Holt McCallany. Fritz was a cruel and abusive father to all of his sons, forcing them into the horrendous profession of wrestling. Fritz frequently pitted one son against the other, causing physical and psychological damage to all four of them. Along with the injuries during the wrestling matches, several suicides added to the belief that this family was cursed.
This movie also stars Maura Tierney as Doris Von Erich, the long suffereing wife of Fritz Von Erich, who had to endure years of tragedies and funerals all because of an abusive husband and an idiotic sport. Lily James is also a standout as Pam, Kevin Von Erich's wife.
The Rotten Tomatoes rating for this movie is too high 87%, with my rating around 75%, and a recommendation mainly for the acting and the hard work it took for the 2 lead actors to play these roles.
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