BEST! Mickey Rourke: I
never gave up on Mickey Rourke, even when he was getting kicked off movie sets
because he insisted his dog be present every second of the shoot. He's an odd
guy, a tortured soul, but one of the screen's most exceptional players, an actor
who can funnel
... more his uniquely soulful strangeness into any part -- even opposite
the Marlboro Man (not kidding). Though "Sin City" gave the actor some terrific reviews, we
couldn't really see him. After all, this is the same talent who at one point was
deemed the next Brando (with "Diner," "The Pope of Greenwich Village," "Rumble
Fish" and "Barfly"), so we yearned to watch that face, no matter how much older
and odder it may appear these days. With Darren Aronofsky's fantastic "The
Wrestler," we get just that, watching a bruised and battered Rourke take what
could have felt like a second-generation "Rocky Balboa" story and imbuing his washed-up,
drugged-out, stuck-in-the-1980s pro wrestler with such depth and poignancy and
touching humor that you can't leave the movie unaffected by his performance. If
he doesn't get nominated for "The Wrestler," I'll ... I don't know ... take a
cue from the movie, crank up "Sweet Child O' Mine" and start crying. (Fox
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