Warrior stars relative unknowns Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton but after this action movie, audiences will remember their names.

Tommy Conlon (Hardy) returns home from the Marines after 14 years away. When he gets home he asks his dad (Nick Nolte), a former boxer, to prepare him forSPARTA, a mixed martial arts competition. Tommy and his father have a strained relationship since the dad is a recovering alcoholic who deserted the family on his wife’s deathbed.  They are able to reconcile their relationship through Tommy’s training.

Tommy begins fighting and wins a lot of fans because of his nontraditional fighting style. To add to the emotional drama, during the course of Tommy’s rise the public finds out about a heroic incident involving his squad and that Tommy to honor a fallen Marine.

While all this is going on, director Gavin O’Connor, introduces the audience to Tommy’s brother Brendan (Edgerton), a former MMA fighter and now financially in debt teacher. Brendan decides the only way he can provide for his family is by re-entering the ring with his sights onSPARTA.

As you might have guessed, Brendan starts winning fight after fight, setting him on a path towards a battle between his undefeated brother. The two go head to head in a bloody and gut wrenching climax.

These two actors (Hardy and Edgerton) were astonishing throughout the film. They showed their tough exterior throughout the movie but also portrayed the sensitive sides that drove them to enterSPARTA. The fight scenes are intense but the emotional scenes leading up to the finale pack a punch as well.

The soundtrack is not what audiences might expect. O’Connor uses classical composers like Mozart and Beethoven not only as part of Brendan’s training but to add an exciting twist to an action movie.  When Brendan walks to the cage with Beethoven blaring, it is perfect.

This movie was suspenseful and overall a good movie. It was a little confusing at the beginning because of the different point of views (the two brothers and the dad) but after everything comes into play, the real action starts. This movie works by switching viewers loyalties between brothers, both of whom have good reasons for winning. During the movie, I kept changing who I was rooting for until the very end when I had truly gotten the sense of the character’s persona. I would highly recommend this movie but it is more appropriate for older and non-squeamish viewers due to its violence.
I rate this movie four out of five stars.