Full disclosure: the rating I gave this movie is based mostly on the fact that I love professional wrestling—especially wrestling that is considered “vintage.” If I were rating this without this immense affection for the squared circle, let me tell you, brother, there’d be fewer stars. Here’s what I did: I took the score I would have given it as strictly a film critic (one star) and averaged it with the score I gave it as an old school rasslin’ aficionado (four stars). And voila! Two-and-a-half stars.
I Like to Hurt People is not a “good” movie. The film critic side of me knows this all too well. It’s campy, terribly acted, ridiculous, and shoddily put together—but those are the exact reasons I like it. It’s extremely representative of how wrestling used to be, and an example of how many of us old-timers wish it still were.
If you’re not a fan of wrestling—or if you are but have no interest in the history of the business—you might as well skip this one. But, if you’re anything like me, and love all that good old-fashioned, bloody and chaotic wrestling, you’d better put this on your list. The interviews and promos alone make it more than a worthwhile effort.
It’s evident that the film’s director, Donald Jackson, was basically making things up as he went along. Part documentary and part “work” (a wrestling term to describe a scripted element in an ongoing storyline), I Like to Hurt People is the saga of one man’s obsession to ban The Sheik from wrestling. The Sheik was a real wrestler who ran the Detroit territory for many years (the very territory the film takes place in). He was a legitimately violent competitor, with matches that, often, ended with extreme bloodletting (this was a lot more common than you might think back in the good ol’ days). The crusade is taken up by various wrestlers who make it their mission to defeat the dastardly Sheik. In reality, the matches were already planned, and the promos already cut, Jackson simply took the footage and jammed it into his storyline.
This haphazard approach makes for a very stilted and jarring presentation, which will most likely turn the casual observer off. For me though, I couldn’t wait to see who The Sheik was going to bloody up next! All kinds of wrestlers make appearances. Dusty Rhodes, Andre the Giant, Bobo Brazil, Ox Baker, and the Funk brothers are all there and are terrific, as always. The real scene stealers, however, are the managers. The shouting matches between Eddy ‘The Brain’ Creatchman and Abdullah Farouk (Ernie Roth, or as he was most famously known, The Grand Wizard of Wrestling) are pure wrestling gold. I just love this stuff! You just don’t see this kind of thing anymore and it’s a damn shame.
For the purists, this is required viewing. For the “modern” fan (I don’t mean that as a slight, there’s a lot to love about current professional wrestling and its athletes), I still recommend it but have my doubts as to whether you’d enjoy it or not. And you know what, that’s fine. If you’re lacking the enthusiasm I have for this sort of thing, it’s a tough watch. It really is. But if you can muster the patience, I Like to Hurt People is an excellent history lesson on a form of entertainment that is forever evolving and changing. It’s a snapshot of a bygone era, and I’m grateful that it exists, no matter how hard it is to watch at times.
P.S. Watch for the protest signs that read “Stop the Shek!” Hilarious.
James is a writer, skateboarder, record collector, wrestling nerd, and tabletop gamer living with his family in Asheville, North Carolina. He is a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association, the North Carolina Film Critics Association, and contributes to The Daily Orca, Razorcake Magazine, Mountain Xpress, and Asheville Movies.