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“The Iron Claw:” A Story of Family, Brotherhood, and Tragedy

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The opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the views of Her Campus.
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at U Mass Amherst chapter.

Gather your popcorn – and your tissues, we’re talking about The Iron Claw. 

If you are anything like me, you have an extremely limited knowledge of professional wrestling. If so, have no fear – Sean Durkin’s latest film The Iron Claw is a great place to start expanding your knowledge on the topic!

A24 presents the film based on the true story of the famous wrestling family, The Von Erich’s. The first thing I saw about this movie was Zac Efron’s physical transformation during the filming of The Iron Claw for his role as main character Kevin von Erich.

This story takes place when the WWE was known as the WWF, and instead of familiar names like John Cena or Hulk Hogan, there was Ric Flair, Dusty Rhodes, and The Von Erich brothers dominating the ring.

Without getting into spoiler territory, take this as a friendly warning: this is one of the saddest movies I have ever seen.

I genuinely cried (almost let out a full-blown sob in the movie theater) for the latter half of the movie and on the car ride home. When the ending credits rolled, I boldly claimed that The Iron Claw was the top 5 best movies I have ever seen. Now that some time has passed, I think I’ll be sticking to my guns.

The real beauty of The Iron Claw is that I truly believe it’s a movie everyone can relate to. Sisterhood is often a theme we see in the media and movies. Greta Gerwig’s Little Women highlights the bond between sisters and the strength of family, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants novel and movie is another great highlight of female friendships and girlhood.

The Iron Claw sets out to do the same and pay tribute to the bonds of brotherhood. Furthermore, it shows the love, expectations, and pressure your family can put on you, and how that pressure helps you rise to the occasion or could lead to your demise.

Starting off when the Von Erich boys: Kevin, Kerry, Mike, and David are in their early 20’s, the film shows the four brothers training, fighting, and growing through the trials and tribulations of being professional wrestlers. All four brothers are pushed by their father to want to become the Heavyweight World Champion.

The Iron Claw is like a modern-day Greek tragedy.”

The Iron Claw is like a modern-day Greek tragedy. The second half of the movie is just repeated emotional punches to the gut.

The tragedy this family endured is almost too hard to believe – and if it wasn’t based on a true story – my critique would be that the writers created an extremely unpredictable plot.

If you are picking up on my intentional vagueness when it comes to the major plot points, it is only because I feel so strongly about going into the movie with zero expectations and spoilers.

 The Iron Claw follows themes of reinforced multigenerational abuse, starting with Fritz Von Erich, the boys’ father, to Kevin’s call to eventually step up for his own family.

Clocking in at just over 2 hours, the film starts off on the slower side, laying the groundwork for the viewer to understand the family dynamic and history. 

Director Sean Durkin masterfully brought this story to the big screen and Zac Efron’s performance was phenomenal throughout the entire film.

If you are a fan of professional wrestling, you’ll love this film for telling this story and its portrayal of the WWE.

If you aren’t a fan of professional wrestling, you’ll come out on the other side with a new-found respect for the WWE and the Von Erich family.

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Samantha Baldacci

U Mass Amherst '25

Sam is currently a Junior at UMass Amherst studying Biology and Psychology. She enjoys reading, listening to music, aimlessly scrolling on TikTok, and hanging out with friends.