Of all the big award season movies, my favorite has been The Wrestler. (See it, now!) Everyone knows the story by now: big wrestling star from the 80's-- twenty years later: broken down body, broken family, and just plain broke. It was a very real and beautifully tragic character-driven film and Mickey Rourke was absolute perfection in the role.
Part of what made the movie so great was the way it showed how the (without actually naming names) wrestling industry chews up and spits out it's "products." How for every Hulk Hogan and Steve Austin, there's dozens of "Randy's": addicted to painkilers, wrestling at the local high school, and bagging groceries for minimum wage.
So of course, when WWE chairman Vince McMahon first heard about the film, he requested a private screening. Director Darren Aronofsky never revealed what Vince exactly said, but a source close to McMahon was quoted as saying "the word 'negative' isn't strong enough to describe Vince's reaction. [This is] no surprise because Vince's vision of the 2008 image of wrestling and even fading stars directly contradicts what The Wrestler accurately portrays." SOURCE
Since then, the film has received tons of critical acclaim and Mickey won a Golden Globe and has been nominated for an Oscar.
And it seems Vince has now changed his tune. He recently publicly praised the movie and there is even a feature about it on the WWE website where past and present wrestlers talk about the film. Well you know what he likes to say, "It's all about the mon-ey." As well as publicity.
Now he's even managed to get Mickey Rourke to sign on to appear at this year's Wrestlemania in a feud with Chris Jericho. Mickey hinted at it at the SAG Awards last Sunday and last night Chris cut a promo against Mickey on "RAW":
The whole thing troubles me. And I'm a wrestling fan! It's just weird. It would be like Kate Winslet publicly endorsing illiteracy and Nazi's.
I can't fault Mickey too much though. He's riding a huge career high and he knows how those things go up and down so he's taking everything that's coming his way lately (including the Iron Man sequel), but I don't know, it just doesn't seem right.
Another thing that just doesn't seem right? He's reportedly messing around with Evan Rachel Wood. Now again, you can't fault the dude too much. This is another example of things coming his way that wouldn't usually (and she does likes the freaks, you know). But she plays his freaking DAUGHTER and it's gonna kind of ruin that whole awesome scene for me a little bit now.
Not to mention, what is The Academy going to think of all this stuff? Sean Penn better start writing his speech.
In related news, Meryl Streep was recently spotted making out with the kid from Doubt and will face Beth Phoenix at Wrestlemania 25.
"I'll show you who the real Glamazon is!" 
