Year of the Ram

Mickey Rourke climbs back in the ring with The Wrestler.

Comments (0) By Scott Foundas Wednesday, Dec 24 2008

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But The Wrestler is something else entirely — a movie in which Rourke appears in almost every frame of every scene, and where, as German filmmaker Wim Wenders commented upon awarding the film the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, he more than once breaks your heart.

"Let's look at it this way," Rourke says, couching things in the same metaphorical terms he uses with his therapist of more than a decade. "There's a stadium, and they're not going to let you in to play the game, but you're going to be out there buying a ticket to get in. Four years later, you're watching the game from inside the stadium. Three more years go by, and now you're on the bench. Two more years go by, and you're on the field, but they're not kicking you the ball yet. It's been a game of inches."

Rourke in his career-capping/ redefining/resuscitating role.

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Come February, that game of inches may well land Rourke in the end zone of the Kodak Theatre. But no matter what happens, Rourke says there's no danger that he'll ever revert to his hell-raising ways. "I'm so amazed that I'm getting a second chance," he says. "I said this to somebody recently: God's got a plan for us all. I sure as hell wish I would have looked at his instead of mine."