I saw the preview for Fighting with My Family before watching Creed II. I resolved to see it in the theaters because it looked cute, was a real life story about a young woman, Saraya Knight, kicking ass by getting her dream job as a wrestler in the WWE, and I do not see a lot of movies with Dwyane Johnson, but I would like to so this movie would do. Unfortunately I did not want to see it in proportion to the difficulty of actually getting to the theaters that it ended up playing in so I put it in the queue and watched it as soon as it became available on DVD.
Fighting with My Family really surprised me. The cast is actually really good. I did not immediately recognize Florence Pugh, whom I have loved since Lady Macbeth and has been delivering amazing subsequent performances as the star of Midsommar and Amy in Little Women. At the time that this movie was released, she was not big yet so it is interesting to see her take a movie that in retrospect seems a little like slumming it in comparison to her other work and could signal the kind of work that a young woman actor would be expected to take to build up her experience. On the other hand, she is not the only one who took a role that seemed beneath her usual work. Lena Headey, whom I have adored since Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, but has since become a legend for getting paid millions to sip wine and look out windows in Game of Thrones, also appears as the Knight matriarch. So two thespians looked at this script and were impressed enough to jump on board. Nick Frost, a legend from a different genre since Spaced, Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, The World’s End, plays the Knight patriarch. The pairing of Headley and Frost is not instinctual, but for me, I honestly wanted to ditch the kids and have the movie follow her parents around just doing their little spiel.
Headey and Frost kind of steal Fighting with My Family with their enthusiasm, charm and irrepressible delight in each other and their family, but they are not in it long enough to carry the movie on their expert shoulders. The DVDs special features show clips of their characters’ real life counterparts, and naturally Headey and Frost nailed capturing their essence and maybe even elevated it slightly without losing faithfulness. They are the heart of the film. Their appearances and manner contrast starkly with the reality that they are a close knit, loving family. They have a little schtick, a testimonial that they deliver to anyone new who meets the pair. Instead of coming to Jesus, they came to wrestling, and they are so proud to be living their dream as opposed to taking the natural path that violence could have taken them. They are naked and unashamed spirits who discovered their best selves in each other and transmitted that enthusiasm to their children.
Fighting with My Family is torn between being a coming of age movie for their adult children versus a sports biography that follows the well trod beats when chronicling a champion. It should have chosen the prior, which is a better story. The children thought that wrestling would be enough for them too, but did not recognize that they did not know who they are even though they already found what they loved. They were so buoyed by their parents’ confidence and love that they did not realize that once they emerged from their parents’ shadow, in spite of being tough and driven, they had not forged their own sense of self. It is such an intriguing problem. We are so used to children turning out bad because of abuse, but this film shows the flip side. Your identity could be so tied up with your family and their dream that you are not actually certain where you begin, and they end. It is an identity crisis that only emerges when you realize that home will not be enough when it is time to leave the nest.
Fighting with My Family actually reminded me of Don’t Think Twice in the way that it depicts people who achieve the dream with those who will never get it. This dream divides the unit, but the film also has the maturity to understand that the haves and have nots suffer differently. I love when films show the pain of actually confronting the reality of achieving a dream with no hint of mockery. Because this movie focuses on a family, not a group of friends/colleagues, it handles this challenge more effectively than Don’t Think Twice.
Unfortunately because Fighting with My Family was marketed as a biographical sports comedy, I was completely unprepared for the melancholic tone. The film is divided into three parts. The first part meets expectations and shows how the family functions. Early on the film lays the foreboding foundation that Knight children do not always fare so well when they strike out on their own. The middle part is when the family gets divided literally and mentally as Saraya goes to the US to pursue her dream. Even though it is well done, and any viewer knows that it is going to work out otherwise we would not be watching this movie, it is heartbreaking to watch the individual identity crisis and any division within the family. If people did not like the movie, it is because it does not matter how realistic these scenes are and crucial to the story, no one wants to feel that much vicarious genuine pain in their leisure time or watch beautiful relationships be in jeopardy. They feel like real life people, not reality show participants. Also because of the Knights’ role in the community, it feels as if the stakes are high for everyone, not just the characters that we have become invested in. The final part goes as expected and follows expected sports narratives plot twists.
Fighting with My Family’s effort to imbue the logistics of the wrestling world with the same nuance as the family is refreshing, but does not go far enough. There is a nice little lesson to not judge people based on their appearances, but other than hinting that Saraya’s competitors are more substantial than she gives them credit, the movie never sustains that point by showing us that they are. It is a real failure of the movie, which only occurs because the film raises this point otherwise if the movie did not, the viewers would be satisfied with just focusing on the Knight family.
If you are a fan of either Headey or Frost, it is worth seeing Fighting with My Family, but it is an uncomfortable watch that does not fully deliver catharsis in the final act after putting its audience through the wringer. It does not mean that it is not a good movie just maybe a movie that needed its marketing to reflect its content so viewers could be prepared. “Just cause millions of people aren’t cheering you when you do it, it doesn’t mean it’s not important.”