Beyond the Mat (Full Screen)

This movie is one of the best documentaries on wrestling next to
"Brett Hart: Wrestling with Shadows" and the biography on Owen Hart both available through A&E home video.

The movie shows what sacrifices and punishment these guys go through to put a show for us wrestling fans. We see Mick Foley get hit hard with a chair from the Rock when he was a bad guy while his kids and wife look on. His wife is in tears as she sees her husband take a beating.

Anyone who says that wrestling is fake, should try out for the WWF and see how fake it really is. After only a couple of minutes getting backdropped, slammed and hit with a chair by these guys , I am sure you'll see it's not fake,as Hulk Hogan says "its choreographed."

The biggest controversy of the movie is when Vince McMahon, corporate mogul and CEO of the WWF, decided to have this movie pulled off during commercials of the WWF and to ultimately turn his back on the whole project. Thereby making this film an Independent Film since it would no longer receive any help from the WWF.

Nevertheless, Vince, makes several cameos in this movie, trying not to look like the greedy pig he really is.
The timing of this movie is ironic, only a couple of months before this movie came out,Brett Hart would get screwed in his final match in Canada with Shawn Michaels, then in late May his brother Owen would die in a freak accident where he would fall to his death in front of a capacity crowd in a WWF pay per view event (that footage was edited out of the event).

Recently (November 2000), the Hart family made a settlement with the WWF for a whopping $18 million dollars for the lawsuit the Hart's filed against the WWF. The Hart's say they will use some of the money for charity. I can just see the smile on Vince McMahon's face go down right now :-) . Now On to the review.

The film is excellent and is a must see for all you WWF fans. It is already out on DVD with extra footage not seen in theaters. EBAY currently has several auctions for it starting at $10-20.

A bargain for a really emotional,entertaining film.

The Director, Barry Blaustein, who did some of the writing for the Nutty Professor, has shown here that he can do drama as well as comedy.

If you're kid is foolish enough of thinking of getting into wrestling, you might want to show him this film, it will definitely change their mind.

Which is the other theme of this movie, Wrestling is definitely something that is done by professionals.

The "extra footage" while great is not necessarily important
as it contains inteviews with "Chyna" and "Tommy Dreamer"
back when Dreamer was in ECW and "Chyna" was just about to
have boob implants and jaw surgery to make her rugged
image more sexy.

Pay attention also to the former employees illegaly fired Vince
such as Koko B. Ware and the Great Samoan. They were two
favorites fired illegally by McMahon.