 I think you might be starting to hop on the Tom Hardy train a little bit, starting to see the truth. Welcome back to the Life Lessons in Film. And we're going to be analyzing life from film in film. We're going to be making sense of life. Making sense of life through Warrior today. Yeah, okay, we'll start again. Tom Hardy, Joel. Tom Hardy, Joel. It was a mess. Okay, we're going to be making sense of life through Warrior. Tom Hardy, Joel Edgerton, or Joel Edgerton. Either way, both great. Oh, and Nick Noltec, can't forget. Oh my gosh. Third time I watched the movie. That's fantastic. Some ways, movies are my favorite time I watched it. Yeah, it's heavy. It is rough. It is tough. It is brutal. It is impactful. It is powerful. Clotent. It is potent. It is pungent. Triple distilled. Now, 20 seconds to synopsisize the whole film. The story follows two estranged brothers. They were split from a young age. One decided to stay with the mother while the other decided to stay with the father, who was an abusive alcoholic. They end up reuniting because they're both in part of this winter take-all MMA tournament and they have to fight each other at the final round. And it's them following that, and then the family's dysfunction and then trying to get along with their father afterwards. That's okay. The one brother went AWOL after his unit got friendly fired upon by Allied troops. And then he returned back to the States and wanted to train to kind of figure out getting his life back together. So he begrudgingly contacted his dad, which they have no relationship with, bad relationship with. And then his other brother, his other brother, was a physics teacher with a wife and kids with a home being foreclosed on. So there's a lot of pressure on both to make money. Yeah. The one who was at war asked the dad to coach him because he'd been in the sport when he was a teenager already and the dad was the one coaching him. And he wanted the money to, he wanted to win money to give to his father. And he wanted the money to, he wanted to win money to give to a friend of his that they were soldiers, they were both soldiers. And then the other brother wanted it because, you know, to pay. Stop the bank from taking his home. Yeah. Yeah. The family was torn apart. It's not existing. There was no relationship. Yeah. And then the one who went to war had to basically caretake for the mom who then passed away. Yeah. He was on his own. And then he has this resentment and bitterness towards the brother because he's like, you left me. Yeah. The brother left or stayed with the dad. Yeah. And then because also there was a girl that he was in love with. Yeah. And so he felt neglected. Yeah. And he also, he felt, I think, betrayed too because he said, he's like, we both knew that we were trying to get away from our dad because he was abusive and he was destroying, he was distracted to himself and us. So why did you stay with him? Like you should have come with us. You could have helped me take care of mom. Yeah. And he said, well, I fell in love. What did you want me to do? You know, The older brother, obviously both of them were growing up in this abusive home and the parents just, so they weren't the people that they were, that are supposed to nurture and love them and take care of them and that they were supposed to depend on didn't do that. And so you have your sibling. And so sometimes, and that can, that's a lot of times a saving grace to just at least have your sibling. You both are going through this really tough thing and at least, you know, you have your older brother. If dad is, when dad is beating up mom, you can go and, you know, Someone else knows what you're going through. You can help each other through it. Yeah. And when the older brother decided to stay with, with the dad in the end, it was just the most, like the one support system that I do have is choosing this person that wrecked our lives. And on top of that, even though I do understand the fact of him finding love, that is very important. But I do also understand the pain of that. Extra portrayal. And on top of wound after wound, when they finally reunite, his older brothers, I mean, you know, struggling in terms of financially, but he's got wife and kids, he's got his wallet. And he's like, Oh, well, maybe so you, you stuck it out with the abuser and now look at your life. You know, look at me where I, I had decided to leave the abuser and protect our mother. And I was screwed after that because of that choice. If I were in that position, if I did find love, do I cultivate the love that I have with this person that I found? And also take care of my family or be supportive as the supportive older brother. It's, it's so hard for me because I know at the end of the day, everybody has their own life, life to live. I just feel like they both were so young, right? When they were separated. And at that time it's, it's hard for me to say that it was okay for the older brother to leave because he was still, the younger brother was still needing an adult figure, a parent figure and he was that to me. And so that makes it hard as much as I understand. I guess it really just shouldn't have had, shouldn't have ever had to come to that. No one should have to make that choice, especially I think they were both teenagers, right? But then you also get where the older brother was feeling like, well, I didn't want to abandon you too. I guess I kind of wanted both. I wanted to be with the person that I fell in love with, but also stay in contact with you guys. But you didn't, you cut ties with me and then you didn't let me know when our mother passed away. Yeah, I mean, what you're saying is completely right. The brothers, both of them were parentified. There were no adult figures in the family for both of the two brothers. It was unfair for them to have to assume these roles of taking care of their own parents. I know, I remember when the dad, he falls off the wagon after a thousand over a thousand days over because of an kind of like an altercation that he has with the younger son. And then he, you know, he goes on a binge and then Tommy, the younger son finds him at a hotel. And then the way that he responded, it was so evident that this was something that he used to do growing up. He knew exactly what he had to do. Dad is drunk. He almost went like switched into being like, I don't want to talk to you. I don't want any communication with you apart from training to seeing him drunk, being like, all right, let's get you into a position where you don't choke on your own vomit or something. Wanted to help her mode, like parent mode. And even like nurturing him and holding him to comfort him. Yeah, like physical touch, stroking him is like, hey, breathe easy. So you know that these are things that they grew up with, right? And so it's unfair on both of them, even for me to say, well, you know, the older brother, I feel kind of like it's hard for me to say, well, you know, it's fine for the older brother to leave, especially because the younger brother needed support. At the end of the day, they were both young. And so I think that's one of the things that's really, really tough, isn't it? And when you do grow up in that kind of home, you know, anyone that is, that does offer that, that love you want to hold on to. And, but man, it was such a heartbreaking movie. It obviously is so much, it's not about the fight at all. The thing about the movie, the dad is trying to make amends. And I remember one time, one of the times that he tries, Tommy is like, you know, I preferred you when you were drunk. He's like, I needed you before. Now I, now you can't do anything for me. And I really felt that it was such a, gosh, it just, that really broke my heart because you have. There's so many things that are just social, cognitive, emotional. You are not able to develop yourself, like to become fully functional. You're not be able to do that. There is no, you're not afforded any tools whatsoever in an abusive home to develop in a way that's going to make you functional, in a way that's going to make you allow you to develop healthy relationships with people and allow you to navigate life, you know, happily. A lot of times when you do come from those abusive homes, whatever happened in their abusive home, you actually perpetuated, right? There's that whole intergenerational trauma. There is that because whatever, however you grew up, you, that's how you relate with people because that's the only thing you know. And even things like you pursue unhealthy relationships where you are treated, you allow yourself to be treated badly because in your home, you were expected to just take it and not complain or not to expect to be treated kindly. So you then, when you're interacting with people, with the world, you don't respect yourself or you take negative treatment as something that you're deserving of. With the older brother, he was able to break away from that and carve out a piece of the world that was much better. Which is maybe why he was, you know, he probably weighed the options of stay with the abusive dad, but here's a chance of actually breaking out of our family situation. Yeah. You know, maybe he recognized that his partner was someone that could actually help him be healthier and avoid the same cycle. Yeah. When you come up from that family, when you're an adult, there is no going back. There is no going to mom and dad and saying, well, you know, you didn't treat, you didn't raise me right. Even though now the father is wanting amends, you can say sorry, but the damages is truly done. And you now, the responsibility to find a life that is, you know, to find happiness. The responsibility to find happiness rests on you now. Yeah. And it's even harder. The worst part is that now it's even harder because you have to undo all the hurt, right? And then on top of undoing all the hurt, you have to become your own parent and teach yourself how to function in society in a way that your parent should have done. Yeah. So you're dealing with that. You're dealing with the pain of parental neglect. You're dealing with the pain of physical abuse. You're dealing with the pain of how all of that affected or is making your life difficult in the present moment. You know, people talk about forgiveness, right? But like when you do come from that kind of family, and we all do want to forgive it, but it does become so much harder because when you come from that abuse of home, all those things that you didn't get growing up. It's very clear as an adult, there's so many things that you struggle with, things that are so easy that come so easily to other people, they don't come easily to you. And everything goes slower because you're always making mistakes, always trying to figure out. You always have to having to learn all of these new things or, you know, and then there are just so many more obstacles for you because of that. And so that constant reminder, it does make it such a hard thing when your abusive parent then wants amends. Because it's like every single day, the moment I wake up, I am reminded of what you didn't give me. And so it's really, really tough because I'm just trying to deal with that. I'm trying to become a parent to myself. But at the same time, now that you're an adult, you're not a kid anymore. You have the cognitive presence now to know that your own dad did come, probably had their own pain. And whatever they gave you, no matter how awful it was, was literally the best that they could give you because they also didn't get anything. And so now you are dealing with the anger and resentment and the guilt and sorrow of empathizing with your own father who went through... You feel sad and regretful for what they went through but still resentful at the same time, which is a tough, complex bag of emotions to try and deal with. And especially if you can never really resolve it. Even if the dad tries to be buddy-buddy to them after and making jokes or singing songs. And then the whole time he's just like, again, we're training. Like, I don't know why you think you can just come back into my life and we can be friends again. But this is not, you know, you can't just heal decades of abandonment, isolation, shame, everything pain with just, oh great, now we're gonna... Like nothing really changed. Someone might say, well, if you aren't well off and you can't afford to take care of even yourself, why have kids? But I find that that logic is indicative of the privilege of the person. And by the way, I used to have that same logic too. Where I'm like, well, if you grew up in poverty, why are you having kids? Are you not given support or a way to have built self-confidence or any leisure time or recreation to actually develop a way to plan things out? Or to even have people that support you enough to say, so what's your plan for things? Or even the notion of planning or thinking ahead. What do we plan? How do we organize? Yeah, what is that? Think ahead. What is the value of money? The simple stuff. The day-to-day survival, you can't be doing that. The simple stuff. Yeah, that is a luxury. It is really a very ignorant statement I'm realizing. I did also feel really bad for the dad. I can see with this man that he's gone through that whole recovery program and he's trying to heal. And I think he's reflected a lot on his life, which is one of those, you know, the programs help you with. And he's gone for over a thousand days sober. He's listening to audiobooks and he's turned to God. All these things that have helped him gain stability and reflect on his life. And so I think that there is definitely an understanding of what he did and he is trying to seek forgiveness from the kids and to try as much as possible to, you know, help them on in life as much as he can. And the whole thing about no one actually ever being taught in school how to have a healthy family, healthy relationships with your spouse, with your kids, with yourself. No one's ever taught that. You're just expected to know or figure it out on your own. If you don't know how to be a friend of yourself, a friend of your partner, a friend of your family, a friend of you, then the stuff will keep repeating again until we repeat history because we're ignorant of it. In this family, everybody, all of the brothers and the dad, they all want love. They all want understanding and they all want nurturing. And they all want it from each other, but neither of them knows how to give it. And that is such a heartbreaking thing. I've said my piece. I've said my piece. No more pieces to be said. You're starting to, I think you might be starting to hop on the Tom Hardy train a little bit. Starting to see the truth. Coming from that family, right? You struggle to interact with people. You don't know how to interact with people in a healthy way. So even then, you're alone all the time. We would be interested to know what kind of themes you found in the movie that resonated with you. And yeah, if what we said made any kind of sense. But yeah, it was a heartbreaking movie. It's about it. Easy 10 out of 10. Yeah, I thought we weren't doing that anymore. Oh, maybe not. It's still tender. Just watched it. Yeah, we're going to be tender for a bit. Off camera. Yeah. Take care. Be well. Bye.