Celebrating the life of the father of puroresu, the predominant style of professional wrestling in Japan, Rikidzan is a spiritual cousin to The Wrestler, and to Scorceses Raging Bull: all three films are towering, believable paeans to flawed, tragic masculinity, anchored by superlative, committed and possibly definitive performances. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOM5ulw_fOE Like De Niro before him and Rourke after him, Sol Kyung-Gu changed his physical appearance to play the role, packing on over 40 pounds of muscle and rendering himself almost unrecognisable. Perhaps more impressive, however, is that 95% of the films dialogue is in Japanese, and Sol is (like Momota Rikidzan Mitsuhiro himself) from Korea. Its possibly a career best performance. Sadly, very few people would get to see it, as the film criminally underperformed at the box office. In his prime, Rikidzan was Japans Hulk Hogan, their Stone Cold Steve Austin and their Vince McMahon, all rolled into one remarkable, imperfect man. Its fair to say that without him, there might not be a Japanese professional wrestling industry and culture today, and its difficult to over-emphasise how much American wrestlers have gained from the Japanese style over the years. This is a film that every self-respecting professional wrestling fan with pretensions to appreciating more than just the WWE house style should own.
Professional writer, punk werewolf and nesting place for starfish. Obsessed with squid, spirals and story. I publish short weird fiction online at desincarne.com, and tweet nonsense under the name Jack The Bodiless. You can follow me all you like, just don't touch my stuff.
