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This is such an interesting topic. The more you think you look beneath the surface, the more surface you find.
At first glance, it seems clear that Bruce would fold Mel into a wallet-sized pad of meat; I definitely sense genuine hardass capacity in Bruce, while I feel Mel's badassery is all done by stuntmen... But then there is Chuck Palahniuk's axiom that skinny guys will fight until they're burger. I don't know. Who's more likely to have razors under his fingernails? Who's more likely to throw his own blood in the other's eyes? What's at stake? Who has more to lose?
Ah. There's your answer. Bruce has more to lose. If Mel lost, he could say, "Well, what do you expect, I was fighting Bruce Willis." Whereas Bruce would fight with the knowledge that, should he lose, he would be "That guy who got his ass handed to him by Mel Gibson."
I am reminded of the final confrontation between the two heroes of Guy Gavriel Kay's The Lions of Al Rassan, who are bound together by mannish manlove and an appreciation of horseflesh, but fundamentally divided by their loyalty to warring kings. In that book, Bruce Willis' Rodrigo is slain by Mel Gibson's Khammar, and by dying in ritual combat wins the ideological war. |
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