"If you can read this, YOUR PINNED!"
Most of you who are reading this review probably have never heard of this movie. Don't feel bad I had not heard of it either until a buddy of mine alerted me to the fact the he bought it on Blu-Ray. That led to me investigating a little bit and found out a very little bit, I Love Paul Giamotti and I love movies about wrestling. That was enough for me to decide to check it out and boy am I glad I did. Going into this movie not knowing much is a bit of a blessing because when you watch this movie it can really surprise you in how good of an Indy flick this really is. I wrestled in high school at the weight of 126 and I can identify with this movie quite a bit and yes this is a sports movie but its also a very endearing picture of family life and the caring of other people and the film maker here manges to do what so very few directors do now days and that is make you care about the characters you are watching. I'm not going to go into much details about the plot because I want those who read this to go into the movie not knowing much about it other than Paul Giamotti is a lawyer who becomes a guardian for an elderly gentlemen Burt Young and ends up taking care of that gentleman's grandson. Giamotti is also a high school wrestling coach and the young man is quite a talented wrestler and this movie is their story about both wrestling and family life and it is quite an oddly uplifting tale really in a non regular way. Most sports movies are walking cliche's these days with the exceptions of the really good ones and that is where this movie differs, and that is because its not really a sports movie completely and it is certainly not like any of the other underdog sports movies out there. Its a movie with a couple of different themes with a sports setting. The acting in this movie is rock solid, Paul Giamatti is excellent as he always is and is surrounded by Amy Ryan who is always fun to watch do her thing, she is also extremely talented. In the supporting role is Jeffrey Tambor who is one of my all time favorite supporting players in everything he does. The relative newcomer Alex Shaffer who they got to play Kyle was also quite excellent to round everything out. In the end this is a movie that caught me off guard, its has its funny moments and its genuinely touching moments as well and I really enjoyed it very much.
From a Blu-Ray perspective this disc is great, its picture quality framed in its 1.85 aspect ratio and 5.1 DTS master audio. I give the picture quality on this bad boy a 4.5 out of 5 stars and the audio a 4.0 out 5 stars. This is a very dialogue driven movie so the need for the lossless track is not one of necessity but its its nice to know its there. A fair but overall kind of weak assortment of special features rounds out the disc. Overall as good as the movie is, it is very much an indie flick which means it might not be for everyone so a rental is probably the way to go for most folks but if your like me who is a fan of wrestling movies or Paul Giamotti as an actor then this disc is rock solid and you should not hesitate to pick this one up.
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