The first thing that struck me about this movie is how much the creators of the Netflix show pulled from the original incarnation of GLOW. There are a lot of parallels. The Netflix show isn't a documentary but clearly it is more than just a namesake of the original. A number of the real gorgeous lades of wrestling were without a doubt inspirations for characters on the Netflix show.
The documentary is an overview of the TV show of the 1980s. The first 50 minutes of the movie are focused on how the show came to be, who some of the stars of the show were, how populat it became, and why it folded suddenly in 1989. A number of the wrestlers, all women, were interviewed for the movie. The movie focuses on a few of them but there's probably about a dozen of them that make significant contributions to the documentary through interviews. There is also a lot of footage of the old TV show.
There are a few men who were interviewed for the movie. One was the wrestler who trained the women of GLOW, Mando Guerrero. Another, Steve Blance, was originally a writer and later became a referee. There are a couple of men who were very involved in the production of GLOW in the 1980s but who declined to be interviewed for the documentary.
The last 25 minutes of the movie were devoted to getting caught up with what happened to the women of GLOW after the company folded. One of the women, inspired by the production of the documentary, organized a reunion. It is unclear if every single GLOW wrestler made it to the reunion but quite a few of them did, including all the ones who were interviewed for the movie. This part of the movie was was very emotional as many of the women had not seen one another in 15-20 years.
On the whole I was very happy I watched this movie. Watching footage of the old TV show was a lot of fun. I was a teenager in the mid to late 1980s. I remember seeing the show in the TV guide but I don't recall ever watching it. I'm eager to see what else from the original incarnation of GLOW makes it into the next season of the show.
No comments:
Post a Comment