Family is a damning thing sometimes, for better or for worse. Zac Efron’s portrayal in The Iron Claw (2023) stirs up the emotions of any brother, including myself.
Knowing the ending of this movie is what made me want to watch it. I know that may be counterintuitive, as many people would think the opposite. However, knowing what was going to happen made me want to watch.
I’ve tried getting into more “serious” films, you could say. Growing up, I was one to just watch Marvel movies as they came out. Films like this make me realize how much more there is to film than just action.
I may have sprung this movie upon Jessica (I did), but I felt it was one that she would enjoy. It was a good change of pace, a breakaway from the previous movies we had watched. I was sure she had heard of the movie beforehand due to Efron’s starring; I was right.
The film follows Kevin Von Erich (played by Zac Efron) as he progresses through his wrestling career. Kevin has three brothers, Kerry, David, and Mike. They are all very much products of their father, Fritz.
Fritz is a hard-ass. He pushes his sons to be what HE wants them to be, not what they may want. He constantly talks about the “family” when it is very clear that he is simply talking about himself.
All four desire approval from their father. This desire doesn’t come from pride or a wish to make their father proud. It comes from fear.
Fritz’s wishes kill every single one of Kevin’s brothers, and he is forced to watch.
David is pushed by his father to take on the world champion, and decides to juice himself to even have a fighting chance. This causes him to suffer from a ruptured intestine.
After David’s death, Mike is pushed into wrestling to fill the void that remains. Getting hurt in the ring, Mike must undergo surgery on his shoulder. He experiences toxic shock syndrome and is put into a coma. Mike is left permanently damaged and decides to overdose on pills.
Kerry is next on his dad’s list to be the world champion after David’s death. Kerry is ultimately successful in making his father happy. Upon his return home, Kerry gets drunk and takes his motorcycle out in an apparent suicide attempt. This attempt was not successful, but it led to the removal of one of his feet.
Kerry would ultimately decide to end his life on the family ranch after telling Kevin that he was in a bad place. Kevin tells his father that he told him to take care of Kerry, to which Fritz would reply, saying that it was his responsibility. Kevin would nearly kill his father by choking him out, but decides against it.
The final scene of the movie is what brought me to tears. We see Kevin watching his two sons play football with one another. He is sobbing to himself, realizing what his father has taken from him.
The two brothers come up to him after noticing that he is crying. Responding to his boys, Kevin says that he used to be a brother, too. In response, Kevin is told by his sons that they are his brothers now and that they will be forever.
Jessica’s response to the movie was ultimately different from mine, but I truly expected that. It is as follows: “Before the movie, I usually read the description, but I didn’t this time. I just knew that it was some sort of boxing or wrestling movie with Zac Efron in it, and I do like Zac, so that was a good point there for me.
We got to meet Zach and the other brothers to start the movie, and one of them was Jeremy Allen White. I love him as an actor in Shameless, and I was excited to see those two familiar faces interact with each other.
Zac’s brothers would die, and every time it was kind of a result of suicide. We were introduced to all the brothers, and then randomly, their dad would shift his focus on one, and then they would die, and we didn’t really get to see them as characters that much.
I wasn’t really understanding the bigger picture until we got to the end and Cyrus and I talked about it, and then I was like oh this makes so much sense. ” Why were these characters getting thrown into the spotlight so much? It’s because that was the entire point.
The dad was so worried about his legacy since he used to be a wrestler himself, that he was jumping from brother to brother, not even caring what they wanted, not even caring about their mental health, and they were all dropping like flies because they were trying to impress their dad so much. They would end up falling into a hole, and their mental health went down to the point that they were killing themselves.
I’d give this movie three out of five stars. Zach and Jeremy White did a really good job as the brothers. It helped because they were familiar faces. Overall, it was a very, very sad story, and it did not hit me how sad it was until after. Unfortunately, I didn’t understand the story well while watching, but I decided to look up the family afterward.
This was a true story, and I started reading about the actual family, and it’s crazy to me that people look at it as a curse. More than half of the boys who died killed themselves. To think that that’s a curse is not what people should be perceiving it as. People should be looking at it as the result of a selfish father trying to continue his legacy through his sons. The dad had a lot of problems. He let his dream of having the world champion belt in the family go to extremes. I would really just look at this movie and story as a tragedy. The father caused his sons to kill themselves one way or another. He mentally destroyed them and killed all of them. I was happy to see that Zac’s character could get his happy ending at the end, being the only brother left alive.”
To appreciate this movie, I feel like you have to be a brother. While my brother is alive and I see him all the time, the possibility of that not being true is always lingering. There is nothing I want more than to grow up by his side.
I don’t cry often, but this one got to me pretty good. Seeing that Zac’s character could break away so much from his own father that his sons could embrace him as their own brother is what did it for me. Being able to break from the past is what life is all about.
I would give this movie four out of five stars. It is certainly one of my favorites that I have watched in the past few years. This brings us to a very good stretch, and I hope that the film for next week can continue this!
Jessica’s rating – ⭐⭐⭐/ ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Cyrus’ rating – ⭐⭐⭐⭐/ ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Check out our previous review of Project Hail Mary!
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