Warrior

Profound. Moving. Emotional. Wait — is this really the review for a movie that features the brutal sport of mixed martial arts? Some who may have ignored Warrior in fear of experiencing not-another-fight-movie might be pleasantly surprised to find something epicly more complex and deep. Two brothers, separated by their father’s alcoholism, train and compete in a grueling MMA Grand Prix while battling personal demons and hardships. It seems incredibly cliche, but the precise execution, well-written dialogue, and memorable acting work together to create a brutal and compelling drama where family members, connected by blood, cut each other deeper and find forgiveness and healing.

Winning the championship in a fight movie rarely seems to be the ultimate goal — it’s oftentimes a metaphor or a symbol or even a badge that a fighter receives once they’ve finally gotten it; they’ve finally become the person he/she is meant to be. Personal issues, relationships, battle scars — these must be overcome, dealt with, reconciled. Meat must be punched. Stairs must be climbed. In the end — a belt wrapped around their waist, hands raised, crowds jumping into the ring to congratulate and hoist up the new king of the ring. Warrior sets up two brothers on an unpredictable collision course as they seek personal and honorable goals. Tommy Riordan (Tom Hardy) returns home to his once-abusive and now-sober father Paddy Conlon (Nick Nolte). The father and son combo had been responsible for dominating the state in wrestling as coach and prodigy, but those days are long gone. Riordan hopes to train for Sparta, an MMA event with a $5-million purse while Conlon wants to restart his relationship with his estranged son. Forgiveness is hard to find, and Conlon approaches his other estranged son Brendan (Joel Edgerton) in hopes of bringing the family back together. Brendan, a retired UFC fighter turned high school physics teacher, fights for money on the side to pay the mortgage until he’s suspended without pay. He turns to fighting as his main means of making money.

The characters are presented at face value, but things are expertly handled by a film-team that feels like it had a vested interest in the script. Nolte is stirring as the gravely-voiced Conlon patriarch who has turned a new leaf that requires him to ironically show restraint in situations when others would return to violence. As the brothers, Hardy and Edgerton sport similar accents and features. There is chemistry, and the tension is thick. In one scene, Brendan, the older brother, tells his younger sibling that he has forgiven him. It’s a flinch-inducing moment that happens as quick as a jab to the eye, and like the other scenes where bones are about to break, it feels remarkably violent. It is so hard to forgive and so easy to judge. The characters of Warrior learn to forgive because they each see the incredible need for themselves to find it.

Warrior (2011)
Directed by: Gavin O’Connor
Written by: Gavin O’Connor, Cliff Dorfman, and Anthony Tambakis
Starring: Tom Hardy, Joel Edgerton, and Nick Nolte

Rating: 4 / 5

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