NEVERMORE: THE RAVEN EFFECT

The idea of looking at professional wrestlers as artists is a tough sell even in 2025. There’s still a large faction of people that don’t even consider them athletes even when they’re literally doing athletic feats. So the idea of them being artists is still difficult to process for some. Believe it or not - there is a psychological element to wrestling both in front of and behind the camera. Filmed/televised matches and vignettes bring out all kinds of emotions in viewers. That’s an art whether you like it or not. Raven might not be as known to casual fans, but he is the epitome of a wrestling psychologist. He’s someone other wrestlers in the business would call a high IQ wrestler. Raven stands out from the likes of Hulk Hogan, The Rock, Ric Flair, Macho Man and more because his character/“gimmick” was a violent nihilist. The best single image to describe who and what Raven was is the image of him sitting in the corner of the ring with a scowl on his face. Typically, when wrestlers make their way to the ring they feed off of the audience and make their presence big. Raven was the opposite. He took his time to walk to the ring, he didn’t interact with the fans and intentionally sucked the energy out of the building. All of this is an art.

I know's it's somewhat lazy to look at a wrestling film through the lens of The Wrestler but there are real life events that happen even today that the film captures. Early on in the documentary we see a very uninterested Raven interacting with fans at a wrestling convention which is straight out of The Wrestler (this is sort of a reflection of the Raven character which has sort of become the real life persona of Scott Levy).

  

The Wrestler / Nevermore: The Raven Effect

Even with all the accessible information we have on professional wrestling today, Raven is often left out of the conversation of greatest ring psychologists or greatest cerebral wrestlers like Dean Malenko, Arn Anderson, Randy Orton and even Triple H. By not rightfully acknowledging Raven’s importance, it lessens his influence on the wrestling business. Nevermore delves in to the typical documentary stuff like archival footage, interviews from peers and delving in to the subject’s troubled upbringing, but the most important aspect of the film is Raven’s importance to the wrestling business and his insecurities around not being recognized enough. Before antagonistic antiheroes or likable bad guys like Steve Austin, CM Punk or Bret Hart in the late 90s, the Raven character was doing an iteration of that years before in ECW (eastern/extreme championship wrestling). Saying someone is ahead of their time is an overused compliment but it absolutely applies to Raven. Nevermore also doubles as a nice gateway in to the history of ECW and its influence on the wrestling business. By the mid 90s, wrestling was on a decline. The most exciting stuff was taking place in ECW. Not everyone could get it on television at the time making it easy for bigger companies to steal, copy and borrow from them without casual wrestling fans realizing it (I know hardcore wrestling fans don’t like to hear this but the casual fan is always considered the most important demographic to cater to). The idea of hardcore wrestling and using chairs and trash cans as excessive weapons in the ring was popularized by ECW and found its way in to the Attitude era of WWF/E and the NWO era of WCW. Obviously hardcore elements existed in wrestling prior to the 90s but ECW really innovated all of that (again - that’s an art). 

Undertaker’s crucifixion angle in the late 90s (right) came from Raven and ECW (left).

Steve Austin's beer drinking gimmick (right) came from Sandman in ECW (left)...

It is heavily speculated that Steve Austin (right) also got his finisher from ECW legend Mikey Whipwreck (left)...

The idea of total chaos in the ring being a weekly occurrence and not a special event came from ECW.

Successfully executing all of this on television and influencing others to imitate it is an art.


Thankfully this isn’t a WWE produced film so things aren’t hidden or sugarcoated to save face. Imagine a feature-length episode of Dark Side Of The Ring that takes its time to tell a somewhat lesser known but important story.

THE SMASHING MACHINE *UPDATED*

If you can put aside the fact that a 53 year old Rock is playing someone between the ages of 29-32, this movie is surprisingly good. I say surprisingly because I’ve never been a big fan of the Safdie’s films and I never expect much from a Rock performance outside of maybe being entertained. But this exceeded my somewhat low/non-existent(?) expectations. Benny Safdie made a solid movie after splitting off from his brother and The Rock (finally) gave a performance that wasn’t some version of his wrestling persona. To be clear - there are definitely some parts in the film where the pro-wrestler Rock starts to creep out but for the most part he keeps it at bay. And could you blame him? Part of the reason he was cast in this role was because of his pro-wrestling background. I’m sure he had to tap in to that persona for all the physically demanding parts.

Instead of trying to imitate Mark Kerr and do an impression of his unique high-pitched mid-western accent - he just acts. This is something a lot of veteran actors need to do when it comes to biopics. From Viola Davis as Michelle Obama to Sean Penn as Harvey Milk, it seems like actors are more focused on nailing an impression of the subject rather than give a genuine performance. And it usually ends up being an embarrassingly bad SNL skit-level portrayal. That’s not the case here.
At the end of the day this is a mostly single-performance driven movie and The Rock does a fine job of carrying everything on his back for the most part.

The Smashing Machine, based on the 2002 documentary of the same name, follows a 3-4 year period in the life of mixed martial arts legend; Mark Kerr. We follow the ups & downs of his fighting career and the toxic relationship between he and his girlfriend.
Again - most of this falls on the performance of the Rock but it isn’t the only highlight. The Smashing Machine is an interesting mix of brutal fighting scenes and the almost boring day-to-day routine of Kerr (arguing with his girlfriend, training, injecting steroids in secret, doing chores around the house etc). That formula worked for me. The movie goes back and forth between incredibly violent to mundane (the relationship between Kerr and his girlfriend was the most uninteresting part of the story for me).

The Rock wasn't the only performance of note here. I can already feel the snarky comments from the readers forming but I found Ryan Bader’s portrayal of Mark Coleman to be almost Bressonian (monotone, deadbeat, dry, etc). Prior to acting, Bader was a seasoned fighter (this movie only cast real life mixed martial artists). Because his forehead/brow and nose are so beaten up from years of fighting, his performance is lacking certain emotions because he can’t move his face like the average person. And it works! It adds to the realism of it all. There’s even sort of an entire second movie within the movie where we follow Coleman juggling his time between being Kerr’s cornerman/trainer/support system and an aging fighter with only so much time left.

Folks might roll their eyes at this one but all the scenes of Emily Blunt and The Rock doing chores around the house reminded me of Jeanne Dielman…

Jeanne Dielman... / The Smashing Machine

Jeanne Dielman... / The Smashing Machine

Goodfellas / The Smashing Machine

Punch Drunk Love / The Smashing Machine

There's a lot of nostalgia that comes along with The Smashing Machine. Throughout the movie Safdie reminds us that The UFC was a relatively new organization. I remember renting UFC vhs tapes with my friends in the early/mid-90's and following it early on. So when the film namedrops folks like Don Frye and Dan Severn, I'm reminded of my friends, the sleepovers and all the people telling us how UFC will never come of anything. I don't follow UFC at all these days because it's such a massive entity that's too multifaceted to follow. But every time Safdie hints at the early days of UFC I'm reminded of how I was one of the earlier followers decades ago.  

I kind of criticized the casting of The Rock earlier on due to his age but who else could have played a physical role like this? The Rock and Mark Kerr both fall under that racially ambiguous category. When it comes to known/established actors - The Rock was the only person that could have done this. Sure, Benny Safdie could have taken a chance on a no-name and/or up & coming actor but right now it’s about putting butts in seats at the movie theaters and we all know The Rock is going to do that. Even for an "indie" film. This is a separate conversation that’s much bigger than this one movie but we really have no big/physically imposing young leading men right now. Decades ago, 6’-1” actors like Anthony Quinn, Robert Mitchum or James Earl Jones played boxers & wrestlers and made it look believable. Unless I’m forgetting someone I can’t think of too many physically imposing young actors right now. There's also a venn diagram between modern pro-wrestling and mixed martial arts. It makes sense that a former pro-wrestler would play the part of Kerr.
Given how guys like Bautista, Cena and The Rock are used in films today, I can’t help but think how much the ball was dropped by the movie industry by not utilizing old school wrestlers like Harley Race or Nick Bockwinkel as tough guys in the 70’s & 80’s. Imagine Killer Kowalski or Buddy Rogers squaring against Clint Eastwood or Burt Reynolds. I know we had the occasional old school pro-wrestlers like Tor Johnson and Kola Kwariani pop up every now and then but the well was untapped (guys like Hogan & Piper paved the way but they weren't exactly draws). 

I think because we aren’t seeing The Rock pull off the same performance we’ve seen in almost everything he's been in, a lot is being made of this so-called “gritty” performance that's out of his comfort zone. Some are even talking Oscar-worthy. I don’t think The Rock’s acting was that good, but it works. 

If you're a fan of The Safdie's and weary of Benny going off to do his own thing, rest assured that The Smashing Machine has the same style as their previous movies (just slightly more subdued). If you're indifferent towards or not a fan of The Safdie's, I'd still give this a chance even out of curiosity.

THE FOUL KING

Now that the Venn Diagram crossover between professional wrestling and cinema has reached an all-time high, perhaps it’s the perfect time for a re-evaluation of Kim Jee-Woon’s Foul King. It’s completely understandable that this movie isn’t as well known as something like The Wrestler or The Iron Claw. Generally speaking, foreign films still have an unfair stigma attached to them when it comes to English speaking audiences. There’s a good amount of mainstream English speaking audiences that consider anything with subtitles to be “slow” or “artsy”. We see it every day on social media - An actor or filmmaker are asked to name their favorite movies during a press tour and when they list something that isn’t Star Wars or Pulp Fiction they’re called pretentious simply because they like movies where people have accents or something. Not every movie with subtitles is slow or hard to follow. And not every English-speaking film is easy to digest. The Foul King is silly, goofy, sometimes explosively violent and full of heart. Another reason this movie is so niche is because it references non-American wrestling. There is one quick moment that shows a match between Steve Austin and The Undertaker, but for the most part this movie focuses on Japanese wrestling. At the time this movie was made, we were in the throws of the Monday night wars between the two biggest wrestling companies at the time (WWE & WCW). It wasn’t easy to keep up with foreign wrestling in 1999/2000 so it’s understandable that casual wrestling fans would have no idea who’s being referenced outside of crossover stars like Jushin Thunder Liger or The Great Muta. Even the most hardcore wrestling fans couldn't keep up with watching foreign wrestling on a consistent basis outside of reading newsletters & dirt sheets. Instead of Hulk Hogan, Sting and The Rock, The Foul King references wrestlers like El Hijo Del Santo, Tiger Mask and Vader (Vader certainly had a solid career on U.S. soil but he was a mega star in Japan).

Vader's entrance / The Foul King

Tiger Mask's backstage entrance / The Foul King

Masked wrestling plays a huge part in Foul King. The importance and lore behind the masked wrestler, made popular by Rey Mysterio, didn’t really reach American audiences until way later. Prior to that it was more of a novelty compared to wrestling in Japan and Mexico. There’s a scene towards the end of Foul King where our protagonist is partially unmasked in the ring which causes the audience to gasp similar to the classic Rey Mysterio/Eddie Guerrro Halloween Havoc match (it should be noted that while Foul King certainly gets in to the predetermined/"worked" aspects of Pro-wrestling, all of the in-ring scenes are made to feel real). 

 

Halloween Havoc '97 / The Foul King

It isn't identical, but the mask worn by our protagonist in Foul King is similar to the Great Zebra's mask...

The Great Zebra / The Foul King

The film even opens with archived footage of what appears to be a New Japan or All Japan wrestling match.

 

Wrestling aside – Foul King pulls from the likes of The Coen Brothers and Shinya Tsukamoto. It would actually make for a great double feature with Tsukamoto’s Tokyo Fist. Both movies have incredibly similar plots: an unmotivated office worker finds his calling inside of a ring. The only difference is Tokyo Fist is boxing and Foul King is wrestling. As silly as wrestling can sometimes be, it can be a motivation for some. Teachers incorporate it in their lesson plans for elementary school kids. The physical element behind it, when done right, can improve your health. It also just provides an escape.

As far as filmmakers that I respect and like - Martin Scorsese, the Coen brothers - Kim Jee Woon, Indiewire.com

Raging Bull /
The Foul King

Barton Fink /
The Foul King

There are lots of little coincidental shots throughout Foul King that are reminiscent of Scorsese. The basic premise kind of owes a little to After Hours. Imagine if instead of going out for a night in the city, Griffin Dunne's "Paul" joins a wrestling school to cure his lack of motivation in life...

After Hours / The Foul King

After Hours / The Foul King

Taxi Driver / The Foul King

And if you have the stamina, the ultimate triple feature would Foul King, Tokyo Fist and Raging Bull…

Raging Bull /
The Foul King

I have seen almost all Scorsese's films and I continue to be amazed. I'm astonished by his capacity to produce great films. He pushes forward the boundaries and potential of cinema - Shinya Tsukamoto, Variety

Raging Bull / Tokyo Fist

Now that both international films and international wrestling is way more accessible, Foul King could be a double gateway to new alternative lanes of cinema and professional wrestling.

FOUND ME: TIFF 2020 HIGHLIGHT #1

There is a weird stigma and shame that can come along with being a fan of professional wrestling. I’m living proof of this. As a child I was the only kid in my close group of friends that liked it. In high school there were a small few of us but people still thought we were stupid for liking it. And I can’t tell you how many disappointed looks I’ve gotten from certain adult friends in recent years when they discover that the guy who appreciates weird/interesting films & music (that also works on the corporate end of interior design) likes to watch jacked-up men beat each other up in predetermined fights.

Look...I get it. As much as I love the sport even I know it’s kind of silly. Even more silly when it’s out of context. I like to imagine people that aren’t familiar with the world of pro-wrestling flipping through channels and stumbling across something wrestling-related and being genuinely confused...

If you’re unfamiliar with this form of entertainment, what are you supposed to make of all this??


That’s part of what David Findlay’s latest short film Found Me is about. The stigma of liking something (pro wrestling specifically) that’s super niche. In this particular case it’s independent French-Canadian professional wrestling (which should explain why I used the term “super niche” as international indie pro-wrestling is a world unto it’s own outside of “Major” pro-wrestling that's scene on television).
Found Me also plays off of the commonly used phrase; “wrestling isn’t for everyone” (commonly used among people within the pro-wrestling business). It’s not. Even large people with giant muscle and great “looks” aren’t guaranteed success in the business. So you can imagine the additional hill that “smaller” wrestlers have to climb in order to make it. Smaller wrestlers are often told “no” and hear “can’t” so often that at a certain point they must become numb to the sound of those two words. That’s why when “smaller” physique wrestlers like CM Punk or Daniel Bryan finally become household names, it makes it just a little more special because they had to work slightly harder than a John Cena or a Dave Bautista (no disrespect to either Cena or Bautista).


The nameless main character in Found Me is a small-framed guy but he doesn’t want to be a pro-wrestler. He wants to be a referee. I think the reason why this film is a play on the phrase “wrestling isn’t for everyone” is because I think this nameless main character knows he doesn’t have the build to be a pro-wrestler but he can still participate in some way. Sometimes you love something so much that at one point you want to stop being a fan. You just have to find your lane. As long as you have the drive and respect for the business, there are multiple things to do in pro-wrestling outside of being the main attraction. Besides referees there’s managers, announcers, ring side assistants, ticket takers, bookers, etc.

That’s what makes this film so unique and additionally niche in that it focuses on a smaller and sometimes overlooked role (refereeing) within a niche world (indie wrestling) within a bigger niche world (pro-wrestling as a whole).
Found me is a short film so we don’t get in to the specifics of a referee’s job but the film does convey the importance of having one in a match (besides counting to 3 or calling for the bell due to a submission or interference, they sometimes have to keep time, enforce specific rules & stipulations and just maintain a general sense of order).

Earlier on I used words like “shame” and “stigma” because our protagonist keeps his love of wrestling a secret from his friends and significant other. He secretly goes to wrestling shows by himself late at night almost as if he’s ashamed (his secret is eventually found out in a scene that’s quite possibly one of the sweetest cinematic moments of this year).
I don’t think I’m speaking out of turn when I say that Found Me is one of the greatest films to focus on both the joy and shame of loving something like professional wrestling.
I’m not sure what David Findlay’s plans are with this after the festival season but I hope he makes this special film accessible to all. The execution of this movie is much more serious and heartfelt than most movies about Pro-wrestling but at the same time it would make for a great triple feature with Ready To Rumble & Fighting With My Family.

ZEBRAS IN AMERICA EPISODE 120

This week we get in to the first three episodes of Dark Side Of The Ring as well as the phenomenon known as Tiger King.

Enjoy...

THE RIDER

Chloe Zhao’s Rodeo drama The Rider has a lot in common with Darren Aronofsky’s The Wrestler. Both films center around athletes who can’t let go of their respective dreams even at the behest of their doctors.

Hell - there’s even a few identical moments in both movies...

The Wrestler / The Rider

In the above images we see our protagonists having to resort to working at a supermarket in order to make ends meet (neither film paints retail/supermarket work as “less than”. It’s just a shock/wake-up call to go from having thousands of people cheer for you to ringing up groceries). There’s also that element of not knowing how to do anything else besides the sport you’re good at and having to adjust to “normal” life.

Both Rodeo & professional wrestling have a quite a bit in common on a basic level. While wrestling is a bit more popular (and sometimes more lucrative), both sports are dangerous and on the outside of the traditional world of Basketball, Football,Baseball & Hockey.

Watching The Rider unfold reminded me of a very specific (and very real) pro-wrestling story...

Daniel Bryan

In 2014, Daniel Bryan was forced to retire from the WWE (in his early 30’s) due to too many head injuries (much like Brady in The Rider). What hurt so much about Bryan’s retirement is that throughout his career he was told that he was too small and that he would never make it (Bryan’s physique is very different from traditional wrestlers like The Rock, John Cena and Triple H). Right at the very moment that Daniel Bryan proved everyone wrong (he won multiple world titles and was loved by casual fans & internet wrestling marks), he was forced to retire so he wasn’t able to really enjoy the spotlight that he worked 15 years to attain.
After getting clearance from various doctors outside of the WWE system, Bryan is now wrestling again (he’s the current world champion) and back in the spotlight. This worries me because he wasn’t given clearance to wrestle from various doctors for years and suddenly he’s able to compete again? What’s even more worrisome is that Bryan continues to take moves to the head. Am I the only one who thinks that’s a problem? If you weren’t able to wrestle for years due to head injuries, why would you go back to being dropped on your head? I think wrestling fans are so excited to see Bryan return that they haven’t thought about this. Or perhaps they have thought about it (I mean - how could you not?) and are just ignoring it because they want to be entertained.

Note the move Daniel Bryan takes at around 5:05 (keep in mind - this was a person suffering from too many concussions & head injuries prior to this moment)

and about a month ago - Bryan was on the recieving end of a botched move directly to his head (fast forward to about 2:04)...

Unlike Bryan, Brady has stitches and a metal plate in his head from years of abuse as a rodeo rider (this is established early on in the movie). As an added touch of realism - the metal plate and stitches in his head are very real as Brady was a former rodeo competitor who had to cut his career short for the same reasons as the character he plays in the movie. So while The Rider is a fictional film, it’s also damn-near autobiographical (Brady’s sister, father & friends in the film are played by his real sister, father and friends from the rodeo circuit). Also similar to Bryan, Brady has friends (well...one friend) who can absolutely no longer compete in the rodeo due to severe brain damage (Lane). True - Daniel Bryan doesn’t have any close friends with severe brain damage but there are quite a few wrestlers from his class/era that he came up with that can no longer compete because of permanent injuries.

The Wrestler

Daniel Bryan is, to some degree, on his way to being the real life Randy “The Ram” from The Wrestler. Both were given orders to not wrestle again. In Randy’s case he ignored the doctor’s orders and met his (probable) demise at the end of the movie (sorry but you’ve had 11 years to see The Wrestler so I’m not sorry if I spoiled it for you). In Daniel Bryan’s case, it was a difference in opinion from a few other medical professionals that allowed him to get back in the ring. I hate to harp on this point again but - if you’ve had a number of concussions to the point where you weren’t cleared to wrestle anymore - why would you get back in the ring (and take dangerous moves no less)? I’m not a doctor so maybe someone can shed some light on this for me.

Daniel Bryan (L) performing the same move as Randy in The Wrestler (R)

I understand it’s difficult to give up something you’ve worked so hard for. And I’m sure being in the spotlight with thousands of people cheering your name is also hard to let go. But at some point you have to stop and be realistic. Daniel Bryan has a daughter, a beautiful wife, money and lifelong fans. Why risk all of that to wrestle for another 10-15 years and potentially not make it out of your 60’s (for those of you that don’t know - making it out of your 60’s is somewhat of a rarity in the world of pro-wrestling).
Look at The Undertaker. I can’t be the only wrestling fan who gets worried every time he takes a hard bump in the ring (yes - The Undertaker still wrestles part time after two hip replacement surgeries and various other injuries from the last 30+ years).

Brady (The Rider), is still young (early 20’s) and has the opportunity to live a full-ish life outside of The Rodeo (I say “full-ISH” because no matter what - there will still be some medical issues he’s going to have to deal with later in life given the fact that he already has various brain injuries in his 20’s).
Instead of following down the same path as his friend; Lane, Randy “The Ram”, Daniel Bryan and countless others, he has the opportunity to step away from the sport that could very well kill him.


Outside of the rodeo angle, The Rider is one of the few films to represent Native Americans in a non-traditional way (Brady, both the character and real person, are part Sioux). We all know Natives don’t have much of a voice/representation in film. But they have even less of a representation in the world of sports. Think about it - White men are the face of the Rodeo. How many films show Native American athletes in a non-patronizing and/or offensive way?

The Rider is also subtly beautiful with shots that call back to both Terrence Malick and even Andrei Tarkovsky...

Solaris / The Rider

Badlands / The Rider

While The Rider is an excellent movie, it's one of those projects that can easily fall in to obscurity quickly (director Chloe Zhao is moving on to bigger projects as I write this), so if you haven't had a chance to check this out I highly recommend it.

KIDNEYS ON FILM PART SIX: LOWLIFE

If you're certain she's a match, do it - take my daughter's kidney.

Lowlife doesn’t delve very deep in to the kidney harvesting/transplantation process (although there is a rather gruesome scene early on in the film that shows the villain – “Teddy” – harvesting the organs of a woman). But I didn’t expect that (and neither should you). Honestly – any film that sheds any kind of light on kidney disease is alright in my book...

One of the most interesting aspects about Lowlife is that it plays with/(possibly) pokes fun at Quentin Tarantino’s style from the 90’s, yet at the same time does that style better.
The similarities between Lowlife and something like Pulp Fiction are undeniable as far as I'm concerned (on the surface, both films are Los Angeles-based multi-character/interwoven stories).
By the mid/late 90’s you would have thought Quentin Tarantino invented this format of storytelling based on what some critics & fans were saying but that’s hardly the case.
However - Pulp Fiction did in fact directly influence a lot of films from Two Days In The Valley to Go. Lowlife is just another example of films to be (indirectly?) influenced by Pulp Fiction & Reservoir Dog. The only thing is Lowlife might be the best one. Or, like I eluded to earlier, possibly even better than its predecessor.

Both Pulp Fiction & Lowlife have athletes trying to honor their father’s lineage (in Pulp Fiction we have the Butch/watch story whereas Lowlife gives us a 2nd generation Lucha Libre Wrestler trying to honor his luchador legacy). Both films give us a pair of henchmen trying to carry out a mission that goes horribly wrong. We have main characters in both films fighting a drug addiction that never really gets any type of resolution (not saying there needs to be resolution) and both; Pulp Fiction & Lowlife have intimidating crime bosses that carry a serious amount clout in their respective L.A. crime scenes.

Reservoir Dogs / Lowlife
(while neither director invented this particular shot, they still fall under the same umbrella of L.A. crime stories)

and I may be reaching here but I also see a few references to Kubrick...

Lowlife follows various characters that are all connected through a pregnant woman and her soon to be harvested kidney. Beyond that I can’t say much without spoiling the film but trust that it’s the movie event of 2018 thus far.

Now...I am a kidney transplant recipient who happens to love wrestling & the importance of luchador masks so I could be biased (has there ever been a film to combine both elements so well?). But I do have a 100% success rate in recommending this film to people so far... (actually - I cant think of an American film to hammer home the importance of the luchdor in Mexican culture & folklore).


My praise of Lowlife doesn’t come without some type of disclaimer. This is my personal favorite movie of the year so far but it is an acquired taste. The humor is random & lowkey surreal. The violence is sometimes brutal and not for everyone. And the most redeemable character in the entire movie has a swastika tattoo on his face (spoiler - he isn’t a nazi or a racist at all. But you have to watch the movie to see what I mean).

Now...the biggest difference between Lowlife & Pulp Fiction/Reservoir Dogs is the handling of race & racism. First of all - Lowlife Director Ryan Prows actually acknowledges that there are Mexican people in Los Angeles whereas Pulp Fiction doesn’t (not that it’s Quentin Tarantino’s job to represent every type of race in the world but when you’re dealing with L.A., it’s kind of strange to see very little to no Latino representation).

When something racist happens in Pulp Fiction you're kind of supposed to snicker or flat-out laugh at said racism (take Quentin Tarantino shouting “DEAD N*GGER STORAGE” in Pulp Fiction). When something racist takes place in Lowlife, I get the sense you’re supposed to laugh at the absurdity & fucked up audacity behind the racist moments or comments. I think that’s why I enjoyed this film so much. At its core, Lowlife is a dark & fucked up movie with scenes of suicide,  obvious implications of rape & police brutality. But there’s still humor in most frames of the film. Lots of humor. That’s the thing - it’s a comedy. A dark comedy but a comedy nonetheless. It’s difficult to pull off a comedy with those aforementioned elements but Prows certainly succeeded.

Not to sound like my anti-Donald Trump facebook timeline, but there’s no denying that Lowlife is a comment on the post-Obama/present-day Trump world we Americans live in. All throughout Lowlife we see on-the-nose imagery & scenes of police brutality against Black & Brown people and the deportation of Latinos. I’d find it hard to believe that this was coincidental. Unnecessary brutality against Brown skin people seems to be more prevalent these days now that everyone has the ability to film things on the spot (Some older folks would argue things are just the same. People just didn’t have portable cameras handy decades ago).


Lowlife is essentially the phrase; “laughing to keep from crying” in cinematic form.
The scenarios & stories in the film are so dark & cruel (kind of like the world we live in today) that you almost have to laugh at the absurdity to not fall in to a deep depression.

KEVIN GEEKS OUT ABOUT WOMEN'S WRESTLING (MY PRESENTATION ON FEMALE MANAGERS IN PRO WRESTLING)

I know some of my readers are wondering why I've been writing about wrestling so much these days and what it has to do with movies/film. Well...professional wrestling is technically episodic television and television is a first cousin/distant sibling to cinema, so in my mind that counts.

What you're about to read is the written version of my presentation on female managers for the Kevin Geeks Out show on Women's Wrestling.

Enjoy...

I'm not here to try and debunk the fact that the basic/skeletal idea behind female managers & "valets" are rooted in misogyny & eye candy. I get it. It's professional wrestling. This is a boys club we're talking about. And with boys comes T&A. This goes deeper than just professional wrestling. The idea of placing a traditionally attractive woman next to a product (or wrestler in this case) to get sales is one of the pillars of capitalism.

Now...if you're a casual wrestling fan (or not even a fan at all), you're more than likely familiar with the late great Miss Elizabeth. She's famous for managing legends like Macho Man Randy Savage (her real life husband at one point), Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair and a few others. But I never looked at Miss Elizabeth as a manager by definition. She never really managed. She was the epitome of "eye candy" or an accessory (I mean that with respect).


.man·ag·er
ˈmanijər/

noun

-a person responsible for controlling or administering all or part of a company or similar organization.

-a person who controls the activities, business dealings, and other aspects of the career of an 

-a person in charge of the activities, tactics, and training of a sports team.


Miss Elizabeth didn't really do any of the things listed above. Sure she stepped outside of her comfort zone every blue moon but for the most part she was the typical damsel in distress who was always getting hurt or always having to be rescued. She barely even spoke.

What I'd like to get in to are the few examples (of many) that kind of defied the prototypical manager role. Women who weren't concerned with their looks or being princesses. Or...if they were about their looks & being a princess, they were going to do so on their own terms...

"Sensational Sherri butting the boots...uh...heels to Superfly Jimmy Snuka

It was the basic idea of capitalism that got me to look at female managers from a different angle at a very young age. They were more like investors or businesswomen, and the (male) wrestlers they managed were their investments. The women were the ones in charge. In my mind, the men were the pieces of meat instead of the women.

Take Sensational Sherri for example. She was kind of like the "anti-miss Elizabeth". She got dirty, didn't care about her looks in a traditional way, and she stood up to men twice her size.

In this video below you see her attacking Rowdy Roddy Piper to protect her "investment" (Jake Roberts) who was losing...

It should be noted that Sensational Sherri was a professional wrestler before gaining notoriety as a legendary manager. She was tough...

I think it helps for women to have experience in the ring before becoming a manager. It builds character & toughness. It also helps when it's time to protect your investment.


"Jackie" is another example of a tough/non-traditional looking female manager who wasn't afraid to get her hands dirty and beat up men when she had to...

Jackie (Left)

Watch how proud she is of Kevin Sullivan after his match with this nameless jobber. She even proceeds to beat him up after the match is over. That, to me, is a true example of a good manager/investor.

Zelina Vega is a super recent example of a true manager that is more of an investor/extra muscle than an accessory.

Here she is with her investment Cien Almas

Zelina Vega (Right)

And here she is with her signature "hurricanrana" that she always does on the unsuspecting opponents to her investment when the referee isn't looking...

And we cant mention tough female managers without mentioning Chyna...

Chyna

Not all female managers had the muscle or strength like the aforementioned managers so they made up for it by using foreign objects, which, depending on how you look at it, is more grimey than fighting with your bare hands.

Nancy Benoit aka "Woman"

Nancy Benoit/"Woman" took to using a cane to make up for her lack of muscles & fighting ability...

Missy Hyatt was another female manager that didn't have muscles or much fighting ability so she used weapons as well.

Missy Hyatt

In the video below you can see her using a whip to beat Sting...

And when a weapon wasn't available, managers had to use their brains to distract the referees to get another male "investment" to do the dirty work for them.

Deborah McMichael

In the video below we see Deborah McMichael distracting the ref in an effort to secure a win for her "investments"

There are many more examples of legendary female managers who broke the mold and defied the conventional qualities. But instead of showing examples of every single one, perhaps this piece will get some of you to go to YouTube to do some research on your own.