Movie Review Imagine Me and You

Imagine Me and You (2006) 

Directed by Ol Parker 

Written by Ol Parker

Starring Piper Perabo, Darren Boyd, Matthew Goode, Lena Headey

Release Date June 16th, 2006

Published June 24th, 2006

New Rule: Never watch a romantic movie after you have had your heart broken. You can't possibly be objective. Take for instance the new to DVD romantic comedy Imagine Me and You starring Piper Perabo. This pencil thin romance barely scratches the surface of it's characters and is certainly no visual wonder and yet I loved it. I loved it because like great comfort food even the most flawed romance can't help but instill good feelings.

Piper Perabo stars in Imagine Me and You as Rachel, an English girl on her wedding day. Like all brides she is beautiful and beaming in love. Her soon to be husband is Hector (Matthew Goode), Heck to his friends, a super nice guy, handsome, kind hearted and her best friend. According to the best man, Heck's best friend Cooper (Darren Boyd), Rachel and Heck have been married for years and are only now making it official.

The wedded bliss seems unstoppable even after Rachel meets Luce (Lena Headey) and the two have a typical romantic comedy meet cute, Rachel dropped her wedding ring in the punch bowl and Luce fished it out for her. The chemistry between the ostensibly straight Rachel and the openly gay Luce is palpable but Rachel just got married.

Nevertheless Rachel is feeling something and attempts to make friends with Luce but soon the attraction becomes undeniable and someone is going to get hurt.

It's not all that complicated a story. Poor Heck was doomed from the start of the film. We know this going in so all that director Ol Parker, in his debut picture, can do is try and be funny along the way to prolonging the inevitable which naturally comes with a chase to the airport, don't they always.

The key to Imagine Me and You are the performers. Piper Perabo, employing a surprisingly good British accent, uses her unending likability to smooth over much of the ill will her rather flighty decision making might engender. Lena Headey is a strong presence that any straight woman might have a hard time resisting. She too is likable and pleasant enough that we forgive her for breaking up the cute married couple.

Matthew Goode is a star in the making. Watch him in one of last year's best films, Woody Allen's Match Point, and now here in Imagine Me and You and his charisma is undeniable. The inevitable Hugh Grant comparisons are made only because he is British. Goode is far more weighty and present than Grant who could not pull off the performances Goode has in his first two features. Combining wit, charm and a deep soul Goode's Heck is the only character we truly feel that we get to know in the picture, everyone else is likable but pulled along by the plot.

Even as the characters are thin representations of real people and the plot is terribly predictable and the script is filled with awful platitudes about love at first sight, love eternal and all that romantic stuff, I can't find fault with such a lovable picture.

Never watch a love story when your heart is broken. Remember that. You might watch a movie like Imagine Me and You and with judgment impaired recommend it to all of your friends and various strangers. Like a great piece of comforting candy or ice cream, I can't help but love this ridiculous little romance Imagine Me and You.

Movie Review The Brothers Grimm

The Brothers Grimm (2005) 

Directed by Terry Gilliam

Written by Ehren Kruger

Starring Matt Damon, Heath Ledger, Lena Headey, Monica Bellucci, 

Release Date August 25th, 2005

Published August 25th, 2005 

Director Terry Gilliam's unrelenting clashes with the powers that be have become Hollywood legend. From Brazil to The Adventures of Baron Munchausen to his famously incomplete The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, chronicled in the documentary Lost In La Mancha, Mr. Gilliam has chafed against studio orders as far back as his days as a cartoonist for the famed Monty Python.

Given his proclivity for challenging authority it seemed more than a little unusual that  Gilliam would go to work for noted control freak Harvey Weinstein for his latest film. Not surprisingly, this film also became mired in another of Mr. Gilliam's battles and has suffered for it. After languishing on the shelf for nearly two years, the compromised vision of Mr. Gilliam and Mr. Weinstein is now onscreen in the mixed up form of The Brothers Grimm.

Conflict is what marks all of The Brothers Grimm. From the behind the scenes issues between Gilliam and Weinstein such as the casting of Lena Headey over the director's first choice Samantha Morton to the conflict of the films script vs it's tone and the conflict of the films budget and special effects. Finally the conflict between Miramax and Disney that played at least a small part in the film being shelved for nearly 2 years.

Terry Gilliam nearly quit the picture after the brothers Weinstein, Harvey and Bob said no to casting Samantha Morton in the role of Angelika that finally went to the little known Lena Headey. This was followed closely by the firing of Gilliam's cinematographer Nicola Pecorini, reportedly because he worked too slowly.

Then there is the script credited to Ehren Kruger, famous for his weak-kneed horror scripts The Ring and its sequel. Mr. Gilliam claims the Writers Guild gave Mr. Kruger credit, though it was he and writing partner Tony Grisoni that delivered much of the final product.  Gilliam and Grisoni carry a credit after Mr. Kruger's as "Dress Pattern Makers".

Finally, rumored battles over the budget, compromised by the loss of MGM as a producing partner with Miramax, lead to production being shut down. Mr. Gilliam left the project long enough to complete a whole other film, Tideland. When he returned he completed reshoots, music ,and effects though not necessarily to anyone's satisfaction. The special effects in Brothers Grimm seem especially compromised. The bad cartoon CGI that brings to life the films werewolf is video game quality at best. CGI effects are still among the most expensive elements of filmmaking so one does not have to speculate as to what aspect of the film suffered the most from budget constraints.

One element of the film that survived all of this conflict is the performance of Matt Damon. As Will Grimm the huckster hustler of the Brothers, Damon turns on the charm and shows a flair for comedy that he has famously said he is terrified of. Mr. Damon would much rather play dramatic roles but when the opportunity to work with Terry Gilliam arose, he fought to take part and step outside his comfort zone.  He was initially offered the quieter part of Jakob that eventually went to Heath Ledger. The film is better for  Damon's effort.

The same cannot be said of Mr. Ledger who struggles with the more subdued role. It is ironic that Johnny Depp was once rumored for this part because Jakob as played by Mr. Ledger is a litany of mannerisms very reminiscent of Mr. Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates of The Caribbean crossed with his effeminate intellectual Ichabod Crane from Sleepy Hollow. Homage is not a bad thing but here it only serves to make one wonder how Mr. Depp might have really played the role.

Matt Damon stars as Wilhelm Grimm, the snake oil salesman of the famous Brothers Grimm. With his brother Jakob, Wil sells stories of witches and enchantment to the villagers of hinterland Germany in the 1800's. Utilizing Jakob's scientific wizardry and knowledge of folklore, the brothers stage their ghosts and witches and lure the villagers into paying to get rid of them.

It's a profitable racket until invading French soldiers capture the brothers and force them to take on a real case of enchantment. Lead by General Delatombe (Jonathan Pryce) and his second in command, the torturous Cavaldi (Peter Stormare), the French want the brothers to determine whether a series of disappearances in a small German countryside forest are the work of hucksters like themselves or something more sinister.

With Cavaldi in tow the Brothers head for the forest with the help of a female guide, Angelika (Lena Headey) whose father and two sisters also disappeared in this forest. Once inside the group comes to a gothic tower with no visible entrance. Inside the tower is the cursed Mirror Queen whose enchantments are directly related to the missing girls. They also encounter a werewolf and trees that come to life with bloodthirsty intentions.

The plot is adventurous and fun in description but in execution it's mixed up and very confused. Brothers Grimm lurches uncomfortably between family friendly adventure and surreal gothic horror. Director Terry Gilliam is certainly comfortable with the surreal part but the family friendly adventure has never been his forte and you can sense a conflict of tone between Ehren Kruger's safe script and Gilliam's darker tones.

Movie Review The Cave

The Cave (2005) 

Directed by Bruce Hunt

Written by Michael Steinberg, Tegan West

Starring Cole Hauser, Morris Chestnut, Eddie Cibrian, Lena Headey, Piper Perabo

Release Date August 26th, 2005

Published August 27th, 2005

Did you know that Cave Diver is a legitimate profession?

I had no idea! To me it sounded more like the title to some long lost "Mystery Science Theater 3000" feature than any legit money making venture. That perception was only enforced by the goofy goings-on in the new creature feature The Cave in which a group of cave divers line up to become lunch for some alien knockoff.

Cole Hauser leads a multicultural cast to their doom as the head of a cave diving team brought to some third world European locale to investigate a massive series of caves uncovered during an archaeological dig. Hey wouldn't you know it, these caves are the cursed remains of a once destroyed church.  They almost always are. Once inside, our intrepid divers are picked off one by one as if the plot had been written by an efficiency expert.

Director Bruce Hunt has little time for developing characters, what with all of this cool cave diving equipment to show off and all of the cool underwater photography to play with. Instead Hunt, with screenwriters Michael Steinberg and Tegan West, opts for multi-cultural placeholders who stand in line and wait for their turn to be monster food. Naturally such a simplistic story has attracted Morris Chestnut who just made this same movie last year with a giant snake, Anaconda 2: The Search For The Blood Orchid. Chestnutt is not a bad actor but has been a magnet for bad scripts (Like Mike, Half Past Dead) and parts well below his talent (Confidence, Under Siege 2) ever since his terrific debut in John Singleton's Boyz In The Hood.

Cole Hauser's rise to above the title star continues to puzzle me. Last year he top lined Paparazzi, a film that never should have seen light outside the video store. Now he leads The Cave which at least has the budget required of a big screen feature but little else. Don't most actors have to prove they can open a movie before they are given two starring roles in a row. Whoever decided Cole Hauser was a star may need to rethink that after The Cave. I would not speak so ill of Hauser, who wasn't bad as one of those nameless character actors with a recognizable face in films like White Oleander and Pitch Black, if he had just stayed with those types of roles.

Almost unrecognizable in this B-list cast is Coyote Ugly star Piper Perabo. Oh how the once promising star has fallen. Ms. Perabo really did look like a star in the overheated Jerry Bruckheimer dramedy Coyote Ugly but she is far from that shining promise here in The Cave where she is only the second most prominent female character in the movie behind Brothers Grimm star Lena Headey. Ouch! If you don't know how good Ms. Perabo is, forget Coyote Ugly, avoid The Cave, and check out the tiny Canadian independent Lost & Delirious. Her earnest romantic tragedy in that film is at times trite but more often moving and lovable.

With all apologies to my mother who always liked to drop that classic mom-ism, 'If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all',  there is simply nothing nice to say about the acting of former underwear model turned TV actor turned movie blackhole Eddie Cibrian. The guy is like a placeholder waiting for a real actor to step in. His blank stare and thudding delivery makes one wonder if he was simply there to block the lighting and then the real actor never showed up.  That is the only way I can make sense of his being here.

Cibrian plays Tyler and Morris Chestnut plays Tom Buchanan. However, whether it was due to bad editing or simple oversight, the actors appear to switch character names throughout the film. In an early scene where the team is plotting its cave descent both characters are referred to as Tyler at least once. That is slightly better than poor Daniel Dae Kim ("Lost") who may as well have been called That Asian Guy because he just doesn't seem to have a name throughout the film.

There were actually some things I liked about The Cave. The underwater photography, for example, is very cool. The crisp, clear blue water is beautifully shot, credited to Cinematographer Ross Emory, although second unit Director Wes Skiles is credited as the Underwater Unit Director. The scuba equipment, so lovingly dissected by the expositional dialogue, I'm told is top of the line stuff by a friend who dives for a living. My friend was also quite impressed with the underwater scenes for what that's worth. He does that professionally as well.

That is about it for the niceties unfortunately. Out of the water, The Cave is a knockoff of the two Anaconda films, Deep Rising, Mimic, Deep Blue Sea and any number of creature features in which an ensemble of B-listers comprise a buffet for some computer generated baddies. All of those films are mere retreads of the ultimate Sci-Fi ensemble flick Alien, which is also the only film to get that formula right, not once but twice if you count its excellent first sequel.

It's a given that particular plots are going to be rehashed, especially when they have been financially successful in the past. In the case of a film with a plot such as this you have to grade on a curve. The key to taking a cliched plot like that of The Cave and making an entertaining movie of it is to dress it up with lighting, with sets, with great dialogue, and with at least a few interesting premises. The Cave has some nice underwater locations that are very well photographed and some cool looking scuba gear but not much else.

Movies like The Cave make me long for the long lost wit and sarcasm of "Mystery Science Theater 3000" in all its movie-bashing glory. Just imagining the fun that Crow, Mike Nelson and Tom Servo could have had slicing up The Cave is more entertaining than anything in the film's 90 some odd minute runtime. Naturally the Alien plot will continue to have knock-offs produced again and again and again as years go by but perhaps they'll die out once we stop throwing our hard-earned money at them. 

Movie Review: 300

300 (2007) 

Directed by Zack Snyder

Written by Kurt Johnston 

Starring Gerard Butler, Lena Headey, David Wenham, Michael Fassbender

Release Date March 9th, 2007 

Published March 8th, 2007

Frank Miller is the pre-eminant graphic novelist of this short century and now that film technology has reached the ability to present his vision on screen we are being treated to some astonishing works. His Sin City, directed by Robert Rodriguez, was a mind blowing exercise in cool. Now comes 300 a historical novel that uses the graphic novel form to render history in a most visceral and modern fashion.

Directed by Zack Snyder (Dawn of the Dead), 300 is about bravery, manhood and desire. But more than anything, 300 is about style and rendering Frank Miller's vision on the screen in the most slavishly accurate ways imaginable, short of just making it straight animation.

The Persian army is spreading like a virus across continents; slaughtering millions and enslaving millions more. Now, standing on the doorstep of the Roman empire, the Persian king Xerxes looks to complete his world domination but first a small band of warriors stand in his way. The greatest warriors in the world, Spartans, stand in a small corridor between the Persians and the conquer of the Roman empire.

Leading the Spartans is their king Leonides (Gerard Butler) who refused to kneel to Xerxes when he was offered a truce. Xerxes is well aware of the reputation of Spartan soldiers as the greatest fighters in the world and had attempted negotiation. Leonides ended the negotiation by killing the messenger. However, before he could go to war he had to consult the gods.

The Ephors, mountain top dwelling cretins, are the conduit between Sparta and the gods. They deny his call for war leaving Leonides with one option. Taking 300 warriors, men with sons who could carry on their names after they die, Leonides heads toward the coasts, toward Thermopylae where he will stand against Xerxes army and hope that his bravery moves the gods enough to bring back-up and take war to the Persians.

Based on the novel by Frank Miller, 300 is a visually arresting force of nature. Director Zack Snyder stunningly recreates Frank Miller's graphic novel with every blood drop and sword whoosh in tact. It is in fact such a slavish recreation that its fair to criticize Snyder for not bringing something of himself to this epic movie.

Snyder's work is there. He was the one slaving over every shot making sure the actors were at home in their CGI environment and the melding is seemless. Zack Snyder's technical chops are unlimited it would seem but at times they can be a little much. Once you have seen one head spinning in slow motion as it disconnects from its body, you've seen it enough. That scene however, along with many others is repeated over and over throughout 300.

It's all visually impressive but once you become accustomed to the style the repetitive nature becomes mind numbing and tedious. It's no help that this film seems louder than most other films. I know for a fact that 300 is no louder than any other action blockbuster, but with it's raging hordes of Persians, elephants, rhinos and freaks it seems louder.

The films rousing, bombastic score from Tyler Bates is so amped up I was preparing for my face to melt ala the screaming demons of Indiana Jones. Bates' score asaults the ears and while it's not a bad score it's often so amped up you may have to cover your ears to make out the notes.

As happens with epic war movies in the era of Iraq; some critics are applying political allegory. Red staters could if they so choose see the Spartans as a small band of American soldiers standing against the hordes of Persians, read Arabs, with George W. Bush as Leonides. Blue staters see in the small band of spartans defending their homeland from hordes of invaders as an allegory for the Iraqis who are fighting the Goliath American army to protect their homeland.

Both are a great intellectual stretch. Not that Frank Miller's story doesn't have it's depth and metaphor but any relationship to Bush administration policy in Iraq is something you bring to the film on your own. 300 is a film that is about itself. This is a perpetuation of style, an exercise in aesthetic and reveling in technology.

The technology is quite breathtaking. From the computer generated elephants and rhinos to the exquisitely sensual rendering of the female form in slow motion, nearly nude, dance, nearly every scene in 300 is a remarkable visual. Some will compare it to a videogame and considering the advances in technology; that is not an unfair or even unflattering comparison.

Is it historically accurate that the Spartans fought battles wearing only leather panties and red capes? This seems an impractical and discomfiting choice of battle wear. They are right on the coast, the spray off the raging ocean alone must be a little uncomfortable. On the other hand, these outfits are perfect for showing off washboard abs and giant pumped up pecs. Whoever was lucky enough to open that Gold's Gym in Sparta must have been a very rich man.

The gay subtext of 300 I'm sure will be uncomfortable for some. But the fact is that with all of these pumped up bodies on display in all of their sweat soaked glory, it's clear that director Zack Snyder wanted some level of homosexual awareness in the picture. Either that or he is clueless and closeted. And there is nothing wrong with that. I admire the bravery of any filmmaker who so daringly displays the male form when the industry standard is to treat women as the eye candy

I liked 300 but I didn't love it. Maybe some of it was the hype or my own high expectations but I was slightly disappointed. From the trailer I expected a similar giddy thrill to what I experienced watching Frank Miller's Sin City. Instead I found myself, mildly thrilled and loving the work of Frank Miller but underwhelmed by the film made from it.

300 is an undeniable achievement in visual filmmaking and that alone is enough to recommend it. Just be sure to temper your expectations. The lower the better.

Movie Review Possession

Possession (2002) 

Directed by Neil Labute 

Written by David Henry Hwang, Laura Jones, Neil Labute 

Starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Aaron Eckhardt, Jeremy Northam, Jennifer Ehle, Lena Headey 

Release date August 16th, 2002 

Published August 16th, 2002 

As something of a writer myself, I can only imagine how difficult it must be to make a film about writing. In Possession, writer/director Neil Labute (with help from Gwyneth Paltrow and Aaron Eckhart) nearly pulls it off. Unfortunately, there is a limit to how interesting watching people conduct research about great writers can be.

Eckhart is an American historian named Roland Mitchell, working and living in Britain. In the midst of researching a poet named Randolf Henry Ash, played in flashback by Jeremy Northam, he comes across a letter that has gone unseen for over a hundred years. Rather than turning it over to his superiors, Roland keeps it until he can verify its authenticity. This leads him to a fellow researcher named Maud Bailey (Paltrow), who is an expert in all things Ash. 

The letter is quite complicated, as it is not addressed to his wife (as most of Ash's work is), but rather, to a mystery woman. For historians, this is an earth-shattering discovery. Ash's fidelity and love for his wife is part of his legend. The mystery woman is a fellow writer named Christabel La Motte (Jennifer Ehle). Her history is notable for her open homosexuality and what was thought to be a fitful relationship with her maid. The deeper the research the more interesting the revelation. I won't spoil the film's many turns.

The story is interesting and well plotted but the romance between Eckhart and Paltrow never quite sparks. The two just don't have the chemistry it takes to make the film burn with the passion Labute is obviously looking for; the kind of passion that would inspire such great romantic writing. In the film's parallel story of Ash and Christabel, there is great passion. Northam and Ehle do burn up the screen and their writing is vivid and lovely.

Unfortunately that isn't enough for me to fully recommend Possession. This certainly isn't a bad film but the lack of chemistry between the two leads undoes most of the strong narrative. For fans of Paltrow, Possession may be a worthy rental.

Movie Review: Fighting With My Family

Fighting with My Family (2019) 

Directed by Stephen Merchant

Written by Stephen Merchant 

Starring Florence Pugh, Dwayne The Rock Johnson, Lena Headey, Nick Frost, Jack Lowden

Release Date February 14th, 2019 

Published February 13th, 2019 

As a longtime fan of the WWE I have known Saraya Knight from her earliest days in wrestling’s big leagues. I saw her win the very first NXT Women’s Championship. I watched live when she debuted on Monday Night Raw and won what was then called the WWE Divas Championship. I was also there when injuries and scandal nearly ended her career. Finally, I was there when she broke her neck and was forced to retire at the far too young age of 25. 

Saraya ‘Paige’ Knight has lived multitudes in her 26 years beginning her wrestling career at age 12 in Norwich, England, working for her mother and father’s very own promotion, WAW. As the story goes in real life and in the new movie on Paige’s life, Fighting with My Family, she never wanted to wrestle as a kid, that was her brother Zak’s thing. Once in the ring however, things changed and she fell in love with the business and began regularly wrestling against her mother, a successful wrestler in England for many years. 

Florence Pugh portrays Paige in Fighting with My Family. We watch as she wrestles against her parents all the while she and her brother Zac (Jack Lowdon) dream of getting a call from the WWE. That call comes when Paige is a mere 18 years old. Paige and Zac are invited to a WWE tryout while the WWE is in London in 2012. A trainer played by Vince Vaughn as an amalgam of many of WWE’s trainers over the years, named in the movie as Hutch Morgan, decides that only Paige has what it takes to go on to WWE’s Developmental system. 

This drives a wedge between Paige and Zac who had always been very close until this happened. Nevertheless, Paige accepts the chance to join the WWE and move away from her family to Florida where the fish out of water portion of the movie begins. Paige is not the prototypical WWE Diva. She’s up against models and athletes who didn’t grow up in the industry but were brought into it, the movie implies briefly, because of their looks. 

Part of Paige’s journey, surprisingly, is coming to respect the leggy blondes who are initially her antagonists. This is a welcome inversion of the classic trope. Our outsider hero has a journey here that is not as straightforward and heroic as it would initially seem. Fighting with My Family was directed by actor-comedian and writer Stephen Merchant, a rather brilliant comic mind who does well tapping both his comic and dramatic skills in Fighting with My Family. 

Fighting with My Family is not a serious movie by any stretch but it is grounded in a way that allows for the broad humor of wrestling to stand out against the mundane regular world. The juxtaposition between the broad and strange world of professional wrestling and the regular world outside of wrestling plays well for the most part, aside from characters played by the director himself and Julia Davis who play stock characters, whitebred outsiders who look down on the low culture of wrestling.

There is plenty to enjoy about Fighting with My Family including the wonderful supporting performances of Nick Frost and Lena Headey as Paige’s parents. These are wonderful actors playing wonderful characters. Frost and Headey appear to bring lifetimes to these two characters that we never see and yet they feel real and lived in. Their chemistry is remarkable, they are all in on the romance, the wrestling and the family. 

Florence Pugh is solid as Paige, though she lacks her swagger and lithe physique. As written, Paige is not the character we know from the WWE. Pugh plays the behind the scenes Paige as a shrinking violet, a homesick and cowed young woman, completely opposite of the wild child, charismatic, divas champion we would come to know and cheer for. There is a stock quality to the story of Paige learning to find herself, find her voice and her confidence. I don’t doubt that the real Paige went on that journey, but this is unquestionably the sanitized, safe for work take on that journey. 

Wrestling fans will undoubtedly recognize how compressed the timeline of Paige’s career is. In real life, Paige wrestled in America before her WWE debut in a company called Shimmer. She also was an overachiever in WWE Developmental where she won over the company brass enough to be picked to win the very first NXT Women’s Championship, months before her post-Wrestlemania 30 Monday Night Raw debut which is the culmination of Fighting with My Family. 

The film fails to mention that Paige was the NXT Women’s Champion when she she debuted on Monday Night Raw and many of the fans in attendance that night were fully aware of who she was when she went to the ring that night against Diva’s Champion A.J Lee, portrayed in the movie by current WWE superstar, Zelina Vega. The makers of Fighting with My Family would have you believe that she was some unknown wrestler getting a shot out of the blue. Then again, the movie would have you believe that Vince McMahon doesn’t exist and pull every string in the company or that a wrestler would make it to Monday Night Raw without seeing Vince first. 

An interesting thing about Paige is that her life after the events of this movie is way more interesting than her rise to fame. From the place where Fighting with My Family ends to today, Paige has gone through career threatening injuries, a sex tape scandal, a reportedly abusive relationship with a fellow wrestler, drug suspensions and eventually, a career ending injury to her neck that led to her having to find a whole new place in the wrestling world. 

That, however, is not a movie that Paige or the WWE would want to make. That’s a complex journey that has fewer of the warm fuzzy moments that Fighting with My Family is built around. That’s a gritty movie with much more humanity and frailty than the mythic, sweet and funny journey of self discovery that is Fighting with My Family. You can’t slap a PG 13 on that movie and mass market it to an audience of young wrestling fans. 

That said, there is nothing fundamentally wrong with not making that movie and instead making Fighting with My Family. Indeed, Fighting with My Family is a perfectly acceptable, if somewhat bland comedy and biopic. The supporting cast is wonderfully colorful and the world of WWE, though it is completely whitewashed, has a fun, mythic quality to it that, as a wrestling fan, I find entertaining. It’s the WWE of Vince McMahon’s fantasy world. 

By the way, for those wondering about Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s role in Fighting with My Family, much of what you see in the movie really happened. It was The Rock who informed Paige that she was going to be debuting on Monday Night Raw, a scene of wonderful comedy in the movie. There are some fudges in the timeline of Paige’s life in WWE and Developmental WWE but that scene really happened in a form similar to how it plays in the movie.