“There’s nothing fake about what we do,” says wrestler Kevin Von Erich (a teak-hued, wardrobe-sized Zac Efron delivering the finest, rawest performance of his career). He’s fielding a coy question from flirtatious fan (and girlfriend in waiting) Pam (Lily James), and he fervently believes what he’s saying. She, reasonably, asks him how anyone can call themselves a “world champion” wrestler when so much of what plays out in the ring is “pre-arranged”. Kevin argues that the performance is the point; that the difference between a Speedo-clad lunk sweating it out on the provincial circuit and a bona fide champion boils down to self-belief and the quality of the show that they put on for the audience.
And this is a central idea in writer-director Sean Durkin’s powerful third film, a factually based account of the larger-than-real-life Von Erich wrestling dynasty, a tragedy-afflicted family that, according to popular legend, came with its own curse. For Kevin, the oldest of four sons raised in the monolithic image and the considerable shadow of their overbearing father and coach, former wrestler Fritz Von Erich (Holt McCallany), this crucial, emotionally stunting and distorting aspect of performance goes beyond his wrestling persona and into the very foundations of his idea of masculinity. To be a man – a real man – as Fritz instils into his sons from birth, is to be the toughest, strongest and most successful out there. And if they aren’t, then they at least have to act the part. They can never show weakness and, categorically, they should never cry. If there genuinely was a curse afflicting the Von Erich men, then this, arguably, was it.
