FILM
THE IRON CLAW
Keeping it in the family: the Von Erich wrestling dynasty.
FIGHTING WITH MY FAMILY: MELANCHOLY EDITION
★★★★★
OUT 9 FEBRUARY / CERT 15 / 132 MINS
DIRECTOR Sean Durkin
CAST Zac Efron, Jeremy Allen White, Harris Dickinson, Maura Tierney, Holt McCallany, Lily James
PLOT The Von Erich brothers are kings of the 1980s wrestling scene. When tragedy hits, eldest brother Kevin (Efron) begins to question their livelihood.
FROM ITS OPENING moments, as Zac Efron’s muscular wrestler heaves himself out of bed and moves to within inches of the camera, The Iron Claw —based on a true story —announces itself as a film about burden. Efron has always been poster-boy fit, but as Kevin Von Erich, the oldest son in a wrestling dynasty, he’s theatrically, uncomfortably buff; the product of years of intense training stipulated by his embittered father (Holt McCallany), himself a faded wrestler still looking to overpower an industry that chewed him up and spat him out.