Sean Durkin’s films are about haunted people. In The Nest, the English manor the characters move to becomes a haunting symbol of their marriage crumbling down around them in the present. The protagonist of Martha Marcy May Marlene is haunted by her traumatizing past in a cult. The characters of the Von Erich brothers in The Iron Claw are haunted by their futures.

The reason for this forward-looking anxiety is the brothers’ parents. Their father, Fritz Von Erich (Holt McCallany), owns the Dallas-based wrestling league the WCCW, and he only really expresses pride and love for his sons when they pursue his passion for sport and succeed. In an early scene, while eating breakfast Fritz ranks the brothers according to how proud he is of them and tells them that they can work to improve their ranking (by accomplishing the exact thing he wants them to achieve).

Their mother Doris (Maura Tierney), for reasons that are never made explicitly clear, has emotionally removed herself from this world of career wrestling and the father-son dynamic that it is created. Another early scene sees her refusing to engage in a family squabble in which the family’s youngest brother, Mike (Stanley Simons), is being bullied into entering the ring by his father. She tells Kevin (Zac Efron) that the brothers need to sort such things out for themselves.

These first few scenes, like early jump scares that prime horror movie viewers to expect a vindictive ghost, establish the haunting. The petty ways in which connections are made and broken between child and parent fuel this family: the brothers have to prove their worth to feel like they are part of the family. Further, the family is always superstitiously aware of the “Von Erich curse” that they believe causes tragedy to follow them wherever they go.

A hulking Efron plays Kevin Von Erich, the oldest surviving sibling at the start of the film (we learn later that the first Von Erich child died tragically at a young age). Kevin is the only professional wrestler when we meet the family. Kenny (Jeremy Allen White) is off training to compete in the discus at the Olympics. David (Harris Dickinson) is preparing for his wrestling debut. And Mike would prefer to be a musician than an athlete, a fact he hides from his father.

As time passes, circumstances shift such that, eventually, all four brothers end up in the ring. Kevin, Kenny, and David wrestle in tag-team bouts, and they all individually find themselves in a position to compete for a title. Although the movie occasionally conflates these championship opportunities with Fritz’s power ranking of his children (ultimately, a lot more goes on behind the scenes of a wrestling federation when a champion is chosen), the realities of wrestling are on full display in the film. Scripted though the narratives are, the sport itself takes a real physical and psychological toll.

Small moments between the brothers in and out of the ring illuminate this toll. Kevin begins as the clear favorite to bring a championship belt to the Von Erich family, but it becomes clear that he has the physicality and theatricality in the ring but not the charisma and trash-talking capability that is required on either side of the fight. In a pivotal moment, David jumps into the ring after one of Kevin’s fights and grabs the microphone, riling up the crowd but also shifting the attention away from Kevin. These small politics of the wrestling ring become crucial to how wrestlers’ careers move forward or backward, and they also factor importantly in the shifting relationships between the Von Erichs.

Durkin’s film is narratively heart-breaking, visually stunning, and approaches a world of professional wrestling that rarely gets the big screen treatment. This combination makes The Iron Claw feel like vital viewing, but it also does not come across as “important” in the didactic way that some awards season contenders do. It is simply an exquisitely crafted film. The cinematography is some of the best I’ve seen all year, and all of the performances are worthy of awards attention that they probably won’t receive. Efron and McCallany, in particular, give their career best performances. Dickinson and Tierney also do fantastic, subtle work in smaller roles.

One of the only issues this film faces is that (and I almost never say this) it may be too short. There is so much story in the story of the Von Erichs that an entire brother is excised from this film, as well as other specifics, like Kerry’s wife and kids and his arrests for drug possession. This could easily have been a streaming miniseries running six to eight hours. At the same time, I prefer a film that is stuffed full and makes the viewer beg for more information. As someone who does not have a history of watching wrestling, that The Iron Claw made me curious about all of the other angles that exist within this timeline of pro wrestling is a testament to its enthralling and morbid draw.

The Iron Claw: A-

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As always, thanks for reading!

—Alex Brannan (Twitter, Letterboxd, Facebook)