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“A truly a knockout film.” – The Wall Street Journal
“Astonishingly compelling!” – The Chicago Tribune

Wrestling With Shadows is perhaps the greatest real life story ever captured on film. Originally set out to document the traditional good vs evil character that Canadian legend Bret Hart deeply believed in, during a time when the world and pro wrestling was taking an edgier route, the film ended up indirectly offering unbridled access to biggest screwjob in wrestling history, where Vince orchestrated Bret’s loss of the WWF title without his knowledge, live on PPV in Montreal. Suddenly the integrity of Bret’s onscreen character and the story it told, became a real life battle between good and evil, as the cutthroat Vince McMahon put business before honor. In this special 10th Anniversary Collector’s Edition you get the original masterpiece of a documentary, as well as The Life and Death of Owen Hart as a bonus disc. Extras include comments from Bret Hart 10 years on (has he found peace?) and an interview with creator Paul Jay, the man behind The Real News Network.

Immediately when watching this documentary you’ll be struck by the amount of backstage footage made available. Never before and definitely never since has any independent film taken you behind the curtain like this does. It’s far from a seedy expose; it simply runs in parallel with Bret Hart’s story. It’s this unbridled access that make people often question the legitimacy of the whole screwjob in the first place. Why on earth would Vince let a camera crew backstage? Rest assured the legal issues that followed blow that myth out of the water. The film barely even saw the light of day. What this footage does do is humanize these larger than life characters we see on TV, bringing a whole different emotion to what happened with Bret and even more so with his younger brother Owen, as well as the other stars we may just consider as big dumb meatheads. Who knew Leon “Vader” White has a degree in business?

A lot of what made Bret who he was/is comes from his father Stu (as it does with everyone), and this piece sheds some light on their realtionship and the relationships of the whole Hart family. It’s tough growing up with a dungeon and a legitimate shooter as a father. Bret would often say he is “the best there is, was, and will be” and you get a sense that he may be trying to prove this to his father. This may also go on to explain why he takes so much pride in the art of wrestling, which during the time leading up to the screwjob was getting lost in a sea of sleaze and raunchiness, which Vince claimed he needed to compete with WCW. Bret grew up getting stretched and having to teach bullies that his dad wasn’t a phony. It’s always going to be real for a Hart!

People often argue that Bret was selfish for not doing what was best for business, booking himself in to the screwjob finish by his own refusal to drop the title, but the aspect of betrayal he felt goes a lot further in this film. You have to consider that Stu Hart sold his Stampede territory to Vince, Bret and Vince worked together and made money together for a number of years, Bret accepted a 20 year deal for less money than a 3 year deal with WCW out of respect and loyalty and Vince gave him his word. It’s not as though he was getting fired from McDonalds, there was a lot of history, friendship and pride to consider. This documentary does a great job of explaining things from Bret’s side, and why it was more than Bret just pouting at losing the belt in front of the Canadian fans that still held him as their hero.

Wrestling With Shadows is one of those documentaries where you pick up something new every time you watch, as your knowledge about wrestling expands and you have more things to analyze. It really is a unique snapshot of the business that will never come our way again. The irony of Julie Hart telling off a blatantly lying and obnoxious young Shawn Michaels who vows on god’s name that he had nothing to do with it, only for Karma to bite him in the ass not even a year later with a debilitating back injury. I’m sure Michaels wouldn’t use the lord’s name like that ever again, especially since he’s now a devout believer.

You can’t be a wrestling fan without having heard about the infamous Montreal Screwjob, and therefore owning this amazing film should definitely be high on your “to do list”. It’s as powerful now as it ever was, especially when as fans we’re beginning to yearn for the same product that caused such controversy in 1997. “History has a tendency of repeating itself”.

The bonus disc “The Life and Death of Owen Hart” is a documentary I’d actually never really heard about, but in the same vein as Wrestling With Shadows it offers a very emotional story. Many people look back on the WWF Attitude Era and its “edgey” product as the greatest era in professional wrestling, but for some of the boys it was an embarrassing and sleazy product that put the final nail in the coffin in regards to the true art of the business. While fans were tuning in to Monday Night Raw in record numbers, Owen Hart was dealing with inner turmoil of having to provide for his family in a business where he felt degraded and no longer had any passion for.

This documentary tells the story of how Owen never really wanted to be a pro wrestler, but put himself through the grind and humiliation to support his family, who he just wanted to settle down and live a normal live with. It’s this that makes his death far more tragic. He essentially died performing a stunt that he didn’t want to do, for a business he no longer believed in, in a company that screwed his brother, all to put food on the table for his family. He was just months away from retiring to his dream home! Once again Vince McMahon found himself trying to explain why what happened was for business and that he had no fault in it.

You look at wrestling’s tragedies and 99% of them stem from some kind of abuse that came from the wrestler’s personal choice. This film shows Owen as a fun loving, caring family man that made the choice to live. He was just too late.

It’s been years since I’ve watched Wrestling With Shadows and over time I’d developed a dislike for Bret, seeing him as whiner and too old school in his beliefs. Being in process of reading his book and having the chance to re-watch the film with the accompaniment of Owen’s documentary I find myself seeing things a lot clearer. Whether it’s the documentary’s powerful use of music, footage and narrative, or the fact that I know more now than ever, I don’t know; but if you haven’t seen this film for a number of years, or you haven’t see it at all, now’s the time to get your copy. The world is full of good and evil; which side will you choose? Or are there too many shades of gray?

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