Final Rating: 1.5/5
It only takes about a dozen minutes of watching Queen of the Ring to realize how much Ash Avildsen’s screenplay struggles to support the story of Mildred Burke, a three-time women’s wrestling world champion and pioneer in bringing the sport to prosperity for women. Avildsen, who also directed the film, is the son of Rocky director John G. Avildsen. There are clear influences drawn from his father’s most recognizable contribution to the medium.
The opening minutes of the film fly by as Mildred Burke, played quite well by Emily Bett Rickards, undergoes multiple life-altering shifts. Things move quickly, as if the film is rushing to get to the wrestling. There isn’t much time given to fleshing out the main characters, and none at all to the supporting cast.
However, the story knows what its greatest assets are. The wrestling sequences, clearly given the most attention and care, are the best things on screen. Rickards, Francesca Eastwood (Mae Young), Marie Avgeropoulos (Elvira Snodgrass), Kailey Dawn Latimer (June Byers), and Deborah Ann Woll (Gladys Gillem) give one hundred percent to their matches, with some of them appearing to do a significant portion of their own stunts. The wrestling is as believable as it comes, particularly in the latter half of the film.
But Queen of the Ring is not capable of filling the remainder of its lengthy runtime with wrestling matches. In telling the story of Mildred Burke, it requires a deep dive into her complicated relationship with manager Billy Wolfe, played by Josh Lucas. Wolfe, a wrestler in his own right, trains Burke and they ultimately marry as a way of establishing a contract between the two. And if that sounds like the precursor to a very messy future, then what follows won’t be a total surprise.
Lucas, unfortunately, gives the weakest performance in the film. His line delivery at times feels forced and disembodied from the character of Wolfe, a womanizing jerk. The writing for the character doesn’t do Lucas any favors, as his mood swings wildly, sometimes within the same scene. Wolfe is a roadblock for Burke many times over, but the breakneck pace of the film never spends time dwelling on it.
Which leads to perhaps the biggest issue with the film. Roadblocks are set up constantly in front of our protagonist and knocked down with unnatural precision. A scene where the black women in the wrestling troupe are denied access to a hotel is overcome within the same conversation and the issue of race never resurfaces. Despite multiple characters mentioning how women aren’t allowed to wrestle each other or at all, that never seems to stop Burke and the others from wrestling. Every misstep that Wolfe makes with regard to Burke and the rest of the women in the film is glossed over by the next scene.
In stark contrast to Billy Wolfe, the movie’s other villain–June Byers–is truly frightening in her scenes. Kailey Dawn Latimer is a real-life former NWA champion and is great casting in the role. The final match of the movie lives up to the billing. As formidable as Latimer’s Byers is, her motivations are given no nuance.
Elsewhere in the film, the supporting cast of male characters are poorly utilized. Tyler Posey plays Wolfe’s son, G. Bill, whose relationship with Mildred Burke is underdeveloped. Gavin Casalegno plays Burke’s son, Joe Jr., who is supposed to be around twenty by the end of the movie. His role in the story is very strange as he desires to follow in Wolfe’s shoes as a wrestling manager writing the stories of the matches, but with no time given to growing his character, the progression feels stilted. It doesn’t help that Casalegno feels older than the character and there’s nothing done to Rickards to show her aging throughout the film. She looks old enough to be his mother at the start when Joe Jr. is a baby, but once Casalegno enters the frame, it starts to pull attention away from what’s actually happening.
The best supporting man in the film is far and away Walton Goggins, who tends to be a highlight in most projects he joins. Here he plays Jack Pfefer, the man credited as one of the first promoters to merge wrestling with theater. Goggins isn’t doing anything special, but his energy on screen matches what the movie is going for in a way that most others don’t.
The film’s myriad of issues stem from the amount of story that’s trying to be told. Mildred Burke’s life is rife with conflict and accomplishment. Her story is a fascinating one. A single mother breaking through the gender barrier of the wrestling world at a time when women weren’t legally allowed to wrestle in many parts of the country is a type of film that has seen a lot of success. Queen of the Ring even references other success stories like Jackie Robinson, and is all the more timely with the recent explosion of women’s sports happening today.
It’s hard to avoid comparisons to Netflix’s GLOW. Perhaps Queen of the Ring would have been better as a series, as well, allowing more time for its ensemble to stand out. As is, any support for the women athletes on screen becomes largely perfunctory. The film’s writing doesn’t help draw in additional passion.
Queen of the Ring puts a story on screen that is more than worth telling, boasts a very impressive cast, and features some solid sequences in the ring. However, it’s consistently held back by the pacing and quality of the writing.
Thank you to Route504 for the screener.
