Warrior is a redemption story with a twist – two estranged brothers from a broken home confront their past and fight for their futures when they both enter a massive Mixed Martial Arts competition for a top prize of five million dollars.
Tommy (Tom Hardy) returns from the marines to confront his previously abusive alcoholic father. Whilst training at a local MMA gym Tommy KO’s their star fighter (a cameo by Erik Apple) in less than a minute. When the video of the fight goes viral Tommy hears about the Sparta competition, and it’s huge prize purse, and signs up for it.
Meanwhile Tommy’s brother Brendan (Joel Edgerton), a high school physics teacher and ex MMA fighter, is finding it difficult to make ends meet. Fighting to make some cash to cover his mortgage payments and support his family he’s struggling to keep up. When another twist of fate puts him even closer to losing everything he persuades his trainer to enter him into the Sparta tournament, where the prize money with turn his family’s fortunes around.
Almost appropriately both Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton went through the mill in the cage during filming, Edgerton tore a ligament in his knee, putting a stop to fight scene filming for 6 weeks, whilst Tom Hardy broke a toe, a finger and several ribs.
The film is incredibly well done, weaving the brothers story lines into the the narrative of the tournament and capturing their individual motivations, as well as featuring some brilliant fight scenes, if you’re looking for a fight film that’s slightly more than your average beat ‘em up film, this is the one for you.
Most memorable line
“You don’t knock him out, you lose the fight. Understand me? You don’t knock him out, you don’t have a home”
– Frank Campana (Brendan’s Trainer)
Our Rating
5 stars out of 5
Check out the film’s trailer below.
