Onryo (wrestler)

Ryo Matsuri (祭遼, Matsuri Ryō) is a Japanese professional wrestler, better known for his ring name Onryo (怨霊, Onryō). He is mostly known for his work in Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling and Big Japan Pro Wrestling. He is the founder of 666 promotion.

Pro wrestling career

Matsuri started his career as Wolf Ozawa in the Tokai University backyard wrestling promotion, where he was contacted by Mens Teioh to train in Wrestle Dream Factory. He adopted the gimmick of Onryo (怨霊, Onryō), based in the Japanese folklore ghosts of the same name, and started to use pale facepaint and shabby clothes which released ashes with each movement. He was in-storyline a dead wrestler who had returned for vengeance, and elements of his gimmick included the ability to turn invisible to his opponents and disappear at will. Onryo gained popularity and appeared in promotions like Pro Wrestling Fujiwara Gumi and Wrestle Association R before signing with Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling. He participated in the Super J Cup 2000, eliminating Curry Man before being eliminated himself by CIMA.

Wrestling

Wrestling is a combat sport involving grappling type techniques such as clinch fighting, throws and takedowns, joint locks, pins and other grappling holds. A wrestling bout is a physical competition, between two (occasionally more) competitors or sparring partners, who attempt to gain and maintain a superior position. There are a wide range of styles with varying rules with both traditional historic and modern styles. Wrestling techniques have been incorporated into other martial arts as well as military hand-to-hand combat systems.

The term wrestling is attested in late Old English, as wræstlunge (glossing palestram).

History

Wrestling represents one of the oldest forms of combat. Literary references to it occur as early as in the Iliad, in which Homer recounts the Trojan War of the 13th or 12th century BC. The origins of wrestling go back 15,000 years through cave drawings in France. Babylonian and Egyptian reliefs show wrestlers using most of the holds known in the present-day sport.

The Wrestler (2008 film)

The Wrestler is a 2008 American sports drama film directed by Darren Aronofsky, written by Robert D. Siegel, and starring Mickey Rourke, Marisa Tomei, and Evan Rachel Wood. Production began in January 2008 and Fox Searchlight Pictures acquired rights to distribute the film in the U.S.; it was released in a limited capacity on December 17, 2008 and was released nationwide on January 23, 2009. It was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc on April 21, 2009 in the United States. It was released in the United Kingdom on June 1, 2009.

Rourke plays an aging professional wrestler who, despite his failing health and waning fame, continues to wrestle in an attempt to cling to the success of his 1980s heyday. He also tries to mend his relationship with his estranged daughter and to find romance with a woman who works as a stripper. Writer Jadranka Skorin-Kapov describes the film as "a social critique of the contemporary fascination with public appearance, the role of the body as a predominant marker of our identity, and the consequences of bodily decay affecting the psyche."