Our Minds Are Trapped Inside an “Iron Claw”
The simple yet essential symbolism of the mental cage we put ourselves in
WARNING: Spoilers for “The Iron Claw” ahead! If you wish to go into it blind, scroll no further!
On New Year’s Eve of 2023, I watched The Iron Claw. It hit me like a ton of bricks. Of course, there’s obvious and unavoidable tragedy to the story it’s telling, which is incredibly heartbreaking. What is sticking with me, however, is the story’s focus on Kevin’s battle for survival, and the attention paid to his struggle to escape from the grasp of the metaphorical “Iron Claw”.
It’s no secret that The Iron Claw is a film that tackles how young men have been taught to handle their emotions for generations, and confronts a general conception of how one should perform the “masculine role” to both one’s parents, siblings, and their own children. Praise has been heaped on The Iron Claw for addressing issues relating to toxic masculinity and emotional abuse, and that praise is earned. It explores these issues with care and makes clear the love each family member has for one another.
What I’m interested is the effects of this emotional manipulation, abuse, these preconceived notions based on societal standards, and how they’re depicted in this movie, and not as much in what caused these effects. The characters of David, Mike, Kerry, and Kevin all suffer from some sort of depression, which only intensifies as the brothers are taken away from each other, one by one. This depression arises from a narrow identity of what makes them worthwhile or valuable, and an inability to find adequate validation from those people or systems they seek it from. The Von Erich Brothers are also taught to contain their emotions, and if they have problems, even with how they’re being parented, to band together to solve these problems. When the Von Erich brothers are together, “they can do anything”. Of course, the brothers all try their best to be resources for one another, but despite their efforts, particularly many such efforts from Kevin, each deals with their problems in a very solitary fashion. They each stuff their emotions down — with Kerry and David resorting to addictive drugs to cope — all in the hopes that they can use wrestling success to overcome their inner turmoil. Instead, the pressures and expectations placed on them within the ring and their singular focus on wrestling often becomes their demise.
Their minds become a cage which they cannot escape. They believe the world would be better off without them, that they would be in a happier and better place if they were to no longer exist, if they were to join their family in the afterlife. I’m sure a feeling similar to this is familiar to many of us. Even if you’ve not been suicidal or felt that the world would be a better place without you, its likely that you have felt without purpose and like you’re trapped in a mental prison which you’re powerless within. In the same way that the Von Erich’s searched for validation, comfort, and a sense of identity within the cage that was the wrestling ring, part of us searches for comfort within the mental prison we’ve created for ourselves. Like the Von Erich’s sought fame, championship belts, and their father’s approval, we search from distractions from our unhappiness, or relationships and/or friendships that will give us a sense of identity that makes our entrapment in this cage worthwhile. Sadly, if our mind functions as the ring did for the Von Erich’s, no external validation alone will allow us to escape this prison.
In fact, there might be a more apt symbolic comparison for the mental traps we find ourselves in. The Von Erich’s signature “Iron Claw” move, which each sibling used after their father’s invention of it, accurately depicts the literal mental cage that the Von Erich’s found themselves within, and one that we often find ourselves trapped inside.
As someone who receives the literal “iron claw”, our heads our literally trapped, and more than anything else, we feel immense pressure being exerted on us, which causes immense pain. When the “iron claw” is used on us, we’re tempted to quit, to give up. It’s the finishing move. It’s inescapable. Sometimes, negative thoughts can feel that exact same way. Sometimes, we feel as though we’re trapped inside our own personal “iron claw”, where every decision/action faces constant pressure and negativity from our own mind, and where it feels like there’s no escape from those negative thoughts/associations. Maybe, for some of us, it may even feel like our own personal “iron claw” will be the “move” that finishes us. Maybe we won’t be able to escape it.
That’s why Kevin Von Erich’s story is so necessary. Because there is a way to escape the prison of the ring, the cage that is the metaphorical “iron claw”. I can’t tell you what that way will be for you, and I can’t tell you that your own personal “iron claw” won’t be a “move” that’s used again on you in the future, but I can tell you that negative thoughts are escapable. Kevin’s story proves this.
Blaming himself for the death of his brothers and trying to protect his new family from the curse he believes has been placed on him and his family, late in the film Kevin devotes himself entirely to the pursuit of the world championship belt against Ric Flair. He punishes his body, works as hard as he can, and lets his bottled frustration and anger overcome him as he performs the “iron claw” on Flair as his finishing move. He refuses to relent when the fight is called and causes Flair’s head to bleed from the immense pressure. It’s in this moment when he’s at his lowest, where his bottled emotions have led to actual violence, not against himself, but against another. He’s at a point emotionally where he longer gains any validation or comfort from being the ring, and it’s led him to inflict real pain, on both others and himself. He knows that he’s reached a point where he must escape the ring. So he does.
He doesn’t escape hurt or pain entirely. His brother Kerry passes after this point in the story. He must mourn and grieve that massive loss, and confront his father's role in that, an outburst that illustrates the bottled nature of his frustrations with his father. However, as his life continues, he chooses to put himself in situations and spaces in which he does not have to bottle his pain, to channel his emotions into something such as wrestling. In fact, he openly allows himself to FEEL, to process his grief and pain, even in situations that he’s been taught not to.
In the scene that caused me to sob, Kevin watches his two sons play football in a meadow outside his house and begins to cry. His sons notice this, and rush to comfort their father. Kevin continues to cry, apologizing to his sons and saying “A man doesn’t cry”, to which they respond “You can cry. Everyone cries” before asking him if he knows why he’s sad. He articulates that it’s because he “used to be a brother, and now [he’s] not a brother anymore”. The boys respond, “we’ll be your brothers, Dad”.
I’ve spent my life processing my emotions by bottling them down, trapping myself in an “iron claw” which it often feels difficult to escape, and with a small part of me feeling like I can’t or shouldn’t cry, that a ‘man shouldn’t cry’ because it displays weakness. It’s not something I was actively taught, but it was learned nonetheless. Many, whether they’re a man or not, deal with their emotions in the same way. Here, I was given permission to cry, to process my emotions, just like Kevin was. Through being around his sons, Kevin was able to find a new way to deal with his grief, the grief that trapped him further and further inside the mental prisons he was so familiar with. And not only was he given permission to deal with his grief, but his sons gave him the assurance that they would “be his brothers”, that they would be there for him to give him a space to process his emotions rather than just keeping them inside.
To know that there is a space for us outside these mental prisons we create for ourselves is powerful. We can choose to occupy these spaces, and to surround ourselves with people and situations that allow us to break out of our own habitual “iron claw” is a brave and difficult thing to do. But it is possible. If Kevin survived, so can we.
