Directed by: Jason Hehir
Featuring: Andre the Giant, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Cary Elwes, Robin Wright, Rob Reiner, Billy Crystal, Jerry Lawler, Vince McMahon, Shane McMahon, Tim White, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mean Gene Okerlund, Dave Meltzer
Andre the Giant was the largest, most recognizable figure in the sports world in the 1970's and 1980's. This was both a glory and a burden for the over 7' tall, 500 lb. giant of a man, who lamented that, because of his size, he could not go anywhere and just be. He couldn't put on a cap and glasses like others and just blend in with a crowd. On 14-hour flights from New York to Japan, Hulk Hogan recalls Andre could not fit into the airplane's restroom, so he excreted into a large bucket which the flight staff had to then empty into the toilet. Cars could not fit him. His back, knees, and frame soon wilted from his sheer size, and surgeries only helped for a time. Because he suffered from Acromegaly, he was told he would be fortunate to see 40. He died of a heart attack in his sleep on January 27, 1993 in France at age 46.
Andre the Giant, the well-paced and touching documentary by Jason Hehir, documents the life of a French teen who at 15 began to grow and wouldn't stop growing. He was destined for a life in the wrestling ring, where he threw opponents around with ease and attracted sellout crowds wherever he appeared. He was so in-demand he would appear in virtually every wrestling territory and was welcomed with open arms by promoters. He was never made a champion, because as Jerry Lawler put it, "Once we made him champion, how could we convincingly have him lose?" Andre was a friendly giant who still had a mean streak against other wrestlers whom he took a disliking to. According to Hulk Hogan, Randy "Macho Man" Savage particularly irked Andre and Andre took liberties with him in the ring. And there wasn't much Savage could do about it.
Andre's partying was also the stuff of legend. Because of his size, he consumed quantities of alcohol which would kill a lesser man. "Women loved him," Hogan said, and based on the pictures of Andre with various beauties, we have to figure it's true. Ric Flair, a legendary party animal himself, couldn't keep up with Andre, and Flair prided himself on being able to hold his liquor. But soon, Andre's body began to break down. By the time he appeared in The Princess Bride, he could barely move. The Princess Bride's director Rob Reiner and cast explained how the fighting scenes, which most would assume would be simple for him given his background, were the hardest for Andre. The cast and Reiner told their stories lovingly, and we feel their genuine affection for the man.
The apex of Andre's career was his match with Hulk Hogan at Wrestlemania III in March 1987, which sold out the Pontiac Silverdome at over 93,000 plus in attendance. Hogan and Andre met in the ring numerous times in the early 1980s, but those matches had faded from the public's memory, and by 1987 Hogan's popularity had eclipsed Andre's. Andre, for the first time in his career, was a heel (bad guy) facing the world's most popular wrestler in Hogan. The documentary painstakingly recreates the suspense and tension surrounding the match, since Andre the Giant waited until the last minute to decide what the outcome would be. Hogan scripted the match, but the ending was up to Andre, who was so respected he was allowed to call the outcome.
"The match was booked on Andre's limitations," recalls one friend, and it was painful to watch Andre lumber around the ring in obvious pain. Hogan won the match and he was stunned to hear Andre yell to him "Slam and leg drop" to orchestrate the famed finish of the match. Hogan's admiration and love for Andre pours forth in every word. It was Andre's final stamp of approval on the immortal career of Hulk Hogan. We then see Andre plodding through later matches until his eventual retirement in 1991. He could barely stand without holding on to something in the ring and his mobility was severely limited, but his love of the sport was such that he felt he wasn't anything if he wasn't Andre the Giant.
The most powerful moment in the film is Vince McMahon's final interview scene, in which he openly laments parting with Andre on bad terms in 1991 and never truly reconciling before Andre's death. McMahon puts up a stone cold front, saying he has a mechanism for not dwelling on the negative, but when asked about whether he took Andre's death harder than most, we see the ice melting and Vince almost to the point of tears. Based on McMahon's hard-ass business reputation, it is probably not often we see him in such an emotional state. Andre the Giant convincingly portrays a man who was bigger than life and with a personality to match. Even those who aren't wrestling fans will appreciate the giant's story and be moved by it.
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