Chris Flackett
If you’ve ever been a dedicated, die-hard fan of a medium, whether it be a TV show, a video game, or even a band, then you’ll know it’s not just the thing itself that makes up the thing you love—it’s all the the auxiliary objects and tie-ins that form the bigger whole of this thing that you love. It’s the t-shirts, the books, the action figures. All of these supplemental items that in themselves do not make up the media you love, they actually serve to enhance the enjoyment and the world of the media, a totem of the intense love you feel in your fandom. It is this attachment that the fanatical feel for objects others see as tangential that Raging Midlife, by director Rob Taylor and written by friends Taylor and Nic Costa, puts front and centre of its story.
It’s a simple premise: childhood friends Mark (Matt Zak) and Alex (played by Costa) are professional wrestling fans who grew up in the 1980s as massive fans of wrestler “Ragin’ Abraham Lincoln”, accompanied by his valet (and wife) Molly Todd (singer Paula Abdul). As kids, at a wrestling event, they caught Ragin’ Abe’s fetching, purple ‘Rageamania’ tank top as he threw out of the ring, a treasured gift from their idol, only for Alex’s jealous sister, Mindy, to burn it. Fast forward thirty years, Mark and Alex have been following lead after lead for another ‘Rageamania’ tank top and finally find one online, only to be outbid at the very last second. The film follows Mark and Alex as they attempt to ‘liberate’ the tank top from its new owner, with Alex having to make a difficult moral choice as he finds out exactly why the new owner wanted the tank top in the first place.
As professional wrestling was probably my own first fanaticism as a kid, watching hour after hour of late-80s WWF (now WWE) action, I can appreciate when real attention to detail has been taken to ensure the period details are correct. You can tell the writers of Raging Midlife are legitimate fans; the attention to detail is outstanding. The ‘WP’ promotion logo on the blue interview screen, for example, alongside the tuxedo-wearing interviewer, is uncannily representative of the era, bringing to mind the late, great ‘Mean’ Gene Oakerland, while the logo is exceptionally close to the WWF logo of the time. There’s also a mock magazine cover whose logo, layout and font are so reminiscent of the WWF magazine of the time that I get a shiver of a nostalgic thrill from the recognition. It’s very well done.
The character of “Raging Abraham Lincoln”, played by the “world’s greatest Macho Man Randy Savage impressionist” Motch O Mann, is over-the-top enough and larger than life in a way that is reasonably true enough to the era—hey, if Vince McMahon can promote someone who was portrayed as a literal dead man, then an Abraham Lincoln gimmick is not too big a stretch!
It helps that “Raging Abe” is pretty much “Macho Man” Randy Savage in all but name, and that Motch O Mann is damn good at portraying the wrestling legend. Even his relationship with valet Mary Todd, who turns out to be Abe’s wife, nicely mirrors Savage’s real-life relationship with his valet, the famous Miss Elizabeth, who just happened to be Savage’s real-life wife. Add in Hulk Hogan-style commandments for Abe as well, and Mr Lincoln is an absolute blast whenever he is on screen. He playfully nails the fun and larger-than-life quality of WWF’s Hulkamania era.
If the film was just a love letter to late-80s WWF wrestling, it would be a ten out of ten for me, no messing. What lets Raging Midlife down, for me, is that despite the idea that the narrative pivots on being a good one, the execution never quite fully connects. Alex and Mark chasing down a t-shirt from their childhood would ideally be motivated by a desire to ultimately use the t-shirt to reconnect to something that they loved and was pivotal to their enjoyment and fanaticism in childhood. They would find that it wasn’t the t-shirt they were really after; it was that childhood rush that they used to get from wrestling that they were looking for in their adult lives. Of course, it’s completely unfair to criticise a film for not being the film that I wanted. But even looking at what we did get with an open mind, Raging Midlife is still a little disappointing on the motivation front.
For example, when Alex dreams of wearing the shirt, sequences that occur a couple of times in the film, he doesn’t transport himself back to the world of wrestling. No; he turns into this preening, peacocking dude who finds that he can destroy things and be forgiven, have drinks just given to him, and endless women throwing themselves at him. It’s a midlife crisis fantasy all right, an anxiety over a specific idea of being masculine, and perhaps we are meant to laugh at Alex, find him foolish that his desire for the t-shirt really springs from a ridiculous belief that the t-shirt will make him more of a man. It doesn’t play out that way in the film, though.
However daft Alex might appear in his madcap schemes, we are clearly meant to identify with him, especially as it is revealed later that he does indeed have a good heart. There is never recognition on his part that the idea of a single ‘correct’ way to be a man is nonsense; he just learns that perhaps somebody else needs the shirt more than him. While that is a commendable realisation, a kind of selflessness, it somehow feels unsatisfying in the balance of things.
On top of this, the humour definitely has a love it or leave it flavour to it. Director Rob Taylor has described the film in the press release as a “John Hughes-style romp”, but the style and humour reminded me a lot more of films from the late-90s/early-2000s such Road Trip and Old School. Alex’s friend Mark is like a hyper, irrational version of Alan from The Hangover, but not as endearing. There is a moment near the film’s end where Mark finally snaps and unleashes a barrage of violence, but the trigger for this is morally questionable. Yet, we are still expected to laugh at Mark as he throws fists left, right and centre because, well, that’s the tone of the film. I will admit, though, that Mark’s tech-hacker friend Rob (played by director Rob Taylor) is extremely funny. His distracted, irrational, unsociable persona had me laughing many times, and if it wasn’t for Ragin’ Abe, I would have said that he stole the film.
Overall, Raging Midlife is not a bad film, and if, like me, you’re a fan of late-80s pro wrestling, it’s certainly worth a watch; it just might not knock you down for the 1-2-3, though.
Raging Midlife is in theatres and available on demand from March 14th.
