It begins with some gentle shots of a slightly peaceful Pittsburgh in winter time before dragging us into the daily routine of Nick Nolte’s Paddy Conlon, a reformed Christian and former alcoholic. Almost instantly it becomes apparent that the environment of the characters will play a crucial part in the mood of the film; the cold and steely Pittsburgh we see comes to mirror the characters themselves. Hardened, stone-faced and bitter; they are a direct product of their environment. Their surroundings are an important element in developing the themes of the story before the film’s epic action-packed finale. Nolte returns home to find his youngest son Tommy (played spectacularly by Tom Hardy) sat on his doorstep. It is their first encounter since Paddy’s drunkenness drove Tommy and their mother from their home and out West years before. He offers his father a bottle of Jameson whisky, Paddy – going on 1000 days sober – refuses and invites his son inside. What follows is a scene which summarises the tough and secretive character of Tommy himself. In the living room he rips his Father’s life to shreds, pin-pointing all the ironies of his father’s changed lifestyle in an almost-accidental bid to start a fight. “I think I liked you better when you were a drunk” – he tells his father, who take all the insults throughout the film, feeling he deserves them for inflicting on his two sons a childhood – which as it is slowly revealed to us in reflection - was both bleak and vicious.
What is possibly most endearing about Warrior is how it prioritises the dramatic scenes against the sporting ones. It’s a good fifteen minutes before we see anything in the way of an actual, physical fight. Director, David O’Conner has first laid down the importance of his characters, he exposes them to us flatly in the first act of the film; a clear sign to the audience that Warrior is not the Jason Statham-type of action film some might have sensed from those posters stretched boldly across the sides of buses, with a ripped and looming Tom Hardy behind the WWE-esque font of the film’s title. This is a drama with sport infused and blended into it. That being said, Tommy’s first stint in the ring – against a UFC middle-weight contender - will be guaranteed to leave goose bumps running across your skin. He knocks his opponent out in a matter of minutes, and it is here that we see the other side of the film. A film about animosity – shown gloriously through the beast-like nature of the character of Tommy.
Warrior goes between Tommy’s story as he, with Paddy training him, builds his way through the ranks of Mixed Martial Arts. Simultaneously we follow his older brother Brendan (Joel Edgerton) in Philadelphia as his secure life as a physics teacher crumbles. Threatened with bankruptcy and with a wife, two children and a home to maintain – he turns to his old sport of MMA out of desperation. Brendan’s tale brings further depth to the story, we delve into his home life with his family, we see him suffer and struggle to convince his old friend Frank Grillo (played by Frank Campana) to coach him, and soon we grow fond of him.
It is a strange thing in a film to have an audience torn between two characters the way Warrior does and not have us choose which character we wish to see succeed; but instead has us rooting for both of them as they train for the same title, unknown to each other. As Tommy rages on in his animal-like fury, we watch him and grow to love his rough charm; the bitter disputes with his father adding further tension to the film. Brendan works his way up in a cleaner, more organised environment. We are given two perspectives of the same world. This a contrast that mirrors in the two brothers themselves: Tommy, who fights brutally for reasons unknown to us until the film’s final act and Brendan, who fights for his life, his family and for a future. It is in this contrast that the film maker’s deserve recognition. Not many films can balance such a hefty plot with so much in the way of drama and action as well as Warrior does. Not only does it balance the stories of the brothers’ excellently, it handles the sporting scenes and the drama scenes equally well. As well as the not-too bittersweet family scenes with Brendan, the training scenes, the random side plots such as the headmaster of Brendan’s school and his pupils following his progress in the tournament; and the soldier’s in Afghanistan who uncover Tommy’s identity through the internet. A lot is going on, but nothing is forgotten and there are no loose ends.
The heart of Warrior is in the bitter relationship between Paddy and his two sons and the most emotive and engaging scenes in the film are not the epic fights which conclude it but the verbal confrontations between the three of them. Paddy – the War vet and former alcoholic who seeks forgiveness but never receives it, Brendan – as angry as Tommy at the childhood his father inflicted on them but guilty of abandoning his younger brother. Then of course there’s Tommy, who lashes out at his brother, his father, his opponents and the world for allowing his life to unfold the way it has. His life has been plagued by suffering since his childhood and he seeks both revenge and forgiveness in his anger. Tom Hardy does an outstanding job of expressing this rage; the turmoil of Tommy’s life and this creates a notable contrast to Brendan’s sombre and honourable demeanour.
Of the many scenes in the film, three stick in my mind more than any other, and each one features a face-off between two of three main characters. In the first half there a scene set in a Pittsburgh cafe where Tommy reluctantly – and rudely – asks his father to coach him. It’s a great scene, with the two men putting each other in their places. “You get something through your skull, too. You called me. So don't go threatening to walk every five minutes” – says Paddy, and in reply Tommy spits “You wanna tell your war stories, you can take 'em down to the VFW. You can take 'em to a meeting, or church, or wherever.” There’s another excellent scene which takes places during the Sparta tournament later on in the film, where the two brothers come face-to-face for the first time since they were teens. On one of Atlantic City’s empty beaches they show-down, Tommy hitting out at his big bro for not being with him as their mother died. It is at times brutal to watch Tommy as he destroys any hope of having a normal relationship with his brother, distancing himself further and further from normality. It helps builds the whole aura of animosity around Tommy himself, the swelling rage, all adding to the intensity of the following fight scenes.
The best scene, however, is when Tommy finally succeeds in breaking his father’s spirit, driving Paddy back to the bottle. He returns to their Atlantic City hotel suite to the father he left behind as a teen - the dangerous, unstable, angry drunk - and it’s in this scene that we see the humane side to the character of Tommy. He returns to familiarity, a father full of hate – like he himself is - and in this scene he shows the only signs of respect for his father in the film as he cares for him and sees him to bed. Nick Nolte reaches his peak as the character of Paddy in this scene, believable and terrifying as the tortured war veteran.
Warrior is charged by its three central performances from Hardy, Nolte and Edgerton, but is not solely dependant on them for its impact. It is well-filmed; the cinematography is honest and often absorbing, driven mostly by natural light, selling Warrior as a real, believable film. The soundtrack is fittingly minimal; music is reserved for moments of emotion or triumph. Worth noting is the split-screen montage midway into the film, documenting the training of both brothers – probably the best sports montage in recent memory. As already discussed the environment of the characters plays a massive role in our overall perception of these characters , and it’s in the cameras exploration of the setting in the first half that sets the mood of the film. These men mirror their own surroundings and were born on the streets of Pittsburgh. The city of Pittsburgh itself was an excellent choice for the setting of the film, a fairly unknown place, forgotten arguably – torn between the East-Coast and the mid-west; between busyness and emptiness. All this mounts up, adding to the grittiness and the realism we feel watching Warrior.
There is however smalls anchors weighing Warrior down, for starters the Commentary which is used heavily for the final tournament in the film feels slightly out-of-place to begin with and takes a while to adjust to. Soon enough the commentary blends into the mood of the final act and eventually helps with the build-up of the fights; but it is a big leap to go from such heavy drama to snappy-line commentary. Another problem is the character of Tess Conlon, Brendan’s wife – played well by Jennifer Morrison - who plays an important role for the films first half but fades away towards the end. She ends up a side-character with little to do as the film progresses, until eventually she is torn between side character and extra, lost and out-of-place in a film essentially about a Father and his two sons; not a father, his two sons and one of the son’s wives. The casting of UFC fighters themselves and wrestler Kurt Angle might confuse a few people, but they play their parts well and are not given enough screen time to destroy the film.
At the end of the day though, this film belongs to O’Conner and Tom Hardy. Hardy is nothing short of glorious as the enraged Tommy, and it would be good to see a few awards go his way for his turn. God-knows he’s earned it.
There will be inevitable comparison here to the other stand-out fighting film of the year – no, not Real Steel – The Fighter, but to me these are two very different films. Yes, they are both set in nearby states. Yes – they both contain a substantial amount of drama; but they are structured in different ways. Plus Warrior doesn’t have a character that resembles the likes of Christian Bale’s unforgettable Dickie Eklund. On top of this, Warrior is made-up. The Fighter was real. Though both films are on equal terms critically, they are great for differing reasons. All comparisons are - as they always are with great fighting films – put side-by-side next to Raging Bull. A film whose representation of the world of competitive fighting has never been matched, Warrior comes close to engaging the viewer in Raging Bull’s themes of brutality and rage, but ultimately has too much of a Rocky-style climax element to it, which works better for it I believe. O’Conner does not delve into as dark a place as Scorcese did, but it works brilliantly for Warrior, whose tone is perfectly real.
Warrior is a film about human nature, animosity, rage, forgiveness and redemption - and it handles all of its themes remarkably. We see the world of Mixed Martial Arts, not as a blunt world of blood and bones where brainless thugs bash skulls; but as a world where hard men with hard lives fight because fighting is all they know. The cage itself becomes a metaphor for the animal kingdom that is the world, and these characters exploit it to us, they show us that violence will always be a part of our culture. When we see the characters beating each other in the ring, we see men exposed as the animals we often forget we are. In every way Warrior is a film about confrontation. Confronting the past, the present and our way of life. In Warrior, physical confrontation is a means of communication far more effective than speech.
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