A George A. Romero Retrospective: ‘Bruiser’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

‘I’m full of surprises.’
- Henry Creedlow

What is genuinely amazing about modern society, is how we’ve been able to create a ‘one size fits all’ approach to assembling a person’s future. Think about it for a moment. Because the instant a young adult enters the high school system, the clock begins to tick on finding them the right path in this world, and the various extracurricular activities they take part in and the push to get them into a good college, is all part of that plan. Because we want these young folks to quickly find a career path and a direction in life so that when they arrive in college, they have an idea of where they want to go, so they can chase a degree in that field with an impunity and a desire that leaves us hopeful for their future and the future of the planet. 
 
Because we know that once this fresh eyed adult settles into their new career and finds a groove, that they will fall in love and have a couple of kids and raise them right, so that their kids will follow the plan and start the cycle over once again, allowing for this well-oiled machine of a system to continue along. But while it is quite lovely to know that our world works in a pretty smooth fashion and that we’ve figured out an incredible approach to keeping modern society chugging along day in and day out, what we don’t like to discuss all that much, is that the system does have its flaws. Because it tends to skew toward folks from certain backgrounds and sadly… the ‘one size fits all’ isn't applicable one hundred percent of the time, because the plan just doesn’t work for some people.
 
For some folks are destined to do other things in life, such as create art or run for office or anything else that we consider to be out of the norm, instead of chasing a standard career and well, these are the folks that definitely struggle within the framework of the system. Simply because they know the instant, they enter its finely tuned structure, that it isn’t for them and their hearts and minds drift toward something more and often times, they eventually find their real passion and direction and follow that instead, leaving the system behind. But for some, circumstances or moments that clue them into their true calling or direction, somehow miss them and they end up pumping through the system and find themselves trapped in a world that they don’t understand and these are the folks that quite frankly can be trouble for the world.
 
Because they are trapped by an environment that confuses them and isolates them for not quite fitting in and well, when someone spends years surrounded by that, they either continue to take the abuse until they finally wake up, and realize there is a whole different world out there that they can be a part of… or their anguish turns into something unexpected and potentially dangerous, and it just so happens that the latter option there is precisely what George A. Romero dives into in his next motion picture; Bruiser. Because Henry Creedlow is precisely that out of place man we’ve just discussed. For he’s obviously a dreamer and a brilliant one at that, one who took every wrong turn possible because of a lack of confidence and self-esteem and the end result puts him in a terrible place where you feel for him early on in the story, since he’s tried to so hard to fit into the system and be a productive member of a world that really has no place for him. 

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Which truly makes this movie appear to be a grand tragedy of sorts, one about a lost soul that finds the strength to finally take charge of his life in the most violent ways imaginable since Henry kills a lot of people in this motion picture, but therein lies the trick. Because Henry is no hero, nor is he some kind of anti-hero. Instead, he’s the guy we hear about on the six o’clock news, the one who finally couldn’t take the bullshit of the world anymore and decided to bring a gun into the office and do horrible things to his coworkers with it. The only difference here is that his strange ability to lose his face when the time comes to take revenge, keeps him anonymous and allows for him to kill with impunity, meaning that in reality, George has taken us in a vastly different direction storytelling wise. Instead providing us with a movie that examines the power of marginalization and toxic masculinity and why these types of men turn to violence in order to find peace. 
 
Something that George explores in painstaking fashion. Because in order to properly understand what motivates violence, we in turn have to suffer alongside Henry. Which means we are privy to every single moment of marginalization, from having something as simple as daily conversation robbed from his lips, to also bearing witness as to how his boss and wife and best friend disregard him as nothing but a meal ticket. Because watching Henry struggle with that kind of pain, the kind of stuff that so many of us would immediately stand up to if it happened to us, really does help us see that the man is in essence, helpless and lost, and that he really hasn't a clue how life is supposed to go. And the moment that Henry changes and becomes 'Faceless' and does his bloody thing, is when we finally understand the root cause of this kind of violence in America. 

Which is a horrifying realization to come to. Because as it turns out, we simply cannot place the blame squarely on modern society and the system we’ve created. Instead, Henry's actions make it clear that the majority of the blame, falls on the shoulders of the men who end up making headlines for their actions. Because they, just like Henry, choose to go this route, and commit to it, and if Henry or these other men took the time to instead reflect upon what’s really making them unhappy in life, then perhaps they could finally alter their course and find a path that genuinely gives them peace. But instead a strange sense of pride, combined with bravado that’s fueled by machismo, motivates them to commit to violence in order to feel as though they matter.
 
Something that relates to modern society after all, and how we view reflection and emotional needs as signs of weakness and really, all of these elements makes this one supremely bleak motion picture. Because this one really doesn’t feature a happy ending, just a broken man who is forever locked within a world of anger and revenge and that honestly makes this one of Romero’s boldest and darkest films for certain, and one of his most brilliant. For it takes guts to assemble a story that takes us inside the head of the villain, but that’s George’s career in a nutshell, since he was always about taking risks and telling bold and dynamic stories that buck the norm. But what’s truly poignant about this particular tale, is that it signaled the end of an era for George. For this would be the last time that he would make a movie featuring everyday people trapped in fantastical situations. Instead, he would spend the rest of his career returning to the world of the dead that he created, and the end result of this decision would be nothing short of spectacular.     

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