I was young when Mickey Rourke came on the scene. As in, pre-pubescent. Later on, when his star was rising, I was an innocent teen (which doesn’t exist any longer, I’m told. Gone the way of lemonade stands and newspaper routs, apparently.) Which goes to say that I have very little pre-boxing experience with the pretty boy actor. Sure, I’ve seen Diner, Pope of Greenwich Village, Barfly, 9-1/2 weeks. But I didn’t experience those films sexually. I missed out on the animal attraction.

It’s not absent from his more recent work, though. Let me tell you.

The bashed face, the scars, the ridiculous awards show suits and shoes, the sobriety–he wears it well. The actual acting is lionesque. (No, I was not on set of the Wrestler to see what was Rourke and what was Aronofsky. But I respect them both enormously, as I do my own ability to recognize their individual efforts on screen.) I have never seen a film like the Wrestler in my life. In fact, I would have to say that Rourke’s performance puts it in my top four favorite films of all time. Along with, ahem, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off , Fargo, and the Wizard of Oz.

(By now I assume I’ve lost anyone who was reading thus far.)

Despite my schizophrenic, and perhaps inexplicable taste in film, I should mention that Rourke’s is the only acting job that ears my nod. I will not defend Judy Garland. Or Matthew Broderick. (Come near my Frances McDormand, and you’re in trouble, though.) I love those films for a variety of factors. Fargo: the writing, primarily. Ferris: the giddy youthful feel, Wizard of Oz: the sheer glory of color and costume and fantasy come to life. Now add the Wrestler: a masterpiece of tragedy, comedy, brutality and tenderness.

 I was embarrased by the character of Randy the Ram, embarrassed for him, hopeful, angry, lustful. All this in well under two hours in a story set in New Jersey. I can’t tell you the last time I gave a crap about anyone I wasn’t related to who lives in Jersey.

Yesterday I watched the Wrestler twice, back-to-back, for my second and third showings in the theater. A bleach-blonde double feature. (Yes, Marisa, you were wonderful. But you didn’t go through hell and back in your career and come back to vanquish. Try some heroin for a decade and get bashed to shit and quit the smack and  then we’ll talk, K?) I could’ve sat through it a fourth time, too. This from a woman who can’t sit still for an entire episode of Seinfeld on DVD.

So thank you, Darren Aronofsky. And thank you, Mickey Rourke. You raised the bar on character for me so high that I can only hope to climb up on a ladder and reach it with my own writing.