I, Tonya, 2017
This was really excellent and fun.
Using a mix of interviews from key figures in Tonya Harding's life (Tonya, husband Jeff, mother LaVona, Hard Copy reporter Martin Maddox, etc), the film takes us through Tonya's lift, from her early years all the way through "The Incident".
Led by an assured, energetic performance from Margot Robbie as Tonya, the film offers up a portrait that is at once unflattering and sympathetic. Tonya is a natural athlete with tremendous strength and nerve, but she faces tremendous pressure from her critical mother and a skating world that admires her technical prowess but considers her inelegant.
Perhaps the biggest takeaway from the film is just how different Tonya's life could have been. Raised by a mother who is determined to make her daughter tough, Tonya's only source of motivation is being told that she can't. LaVona (played in a blistering performance by Allison Janney) is unsparing with her verbal, emotional, and physical abuse. In one sequence, Tonya's coach walks in on LaVona beating a pre-teen Tonya with a hairbrush in a bathroom.
Seeking an escape from her home life, Tonya ends up marrying boyfriend Jeff. I didn't even recognize Sebastian Stan (the Winter Soldier himself) in the role of Jeff. He oozes a sort of goofball charm, which makes it all the more shocking when a physically abusive side rears its head. The fact that Tonya repeatedly leaves Jeff but goes back to him again and again makes a sort of twisted sense when you see their scenes together. Jeff is as abusive as Tonya's mother, but at least he sometimes tells her that she's pretty and talented.
The third rocky relationship in Tonya's life is the one that she has with the sport itself. Tonya is one of few women to be able to land a triple axle jump. But she is frequently dinged for the subjective "performance" element of the score. Even as she outskates her competition on a technical level, she doesn't have the look or the grace or the style that would please the judges. While the film itself doesn't really go after Nancy Kerrigan, it does make a point about the fact that likability can actually determine whether or not you succeed. How many sports will mark you down for not being ladylike enough? Tonya is penalized for who she is, not what she can do. Yes, it's how the sport works, but you can completely understand Tonya's frustration.
The film fully embraces the subjective nature of its presentation of facts. There is frequent fourth-wall breaking that takes place. In one scene, an angry Tonya chases Jeff and fires a gun at him--then she turns directly to the camera, says "I never actually did this", cocks the gun, and moves off-camera. Characters frequently contradict each other in their version of events, and the film seems to almost relish these moments of disagreement. There will never be proof of things like whether or not a certain conversation took place.
The film also does a great job with the ice skating sequences. I don't know the nature of the CGI/effects involved, but they are just wonderful.
I read one criticism of the film in terms of its bold soundtrack, but I didn't mind it. The storytelling here is larger-than-life, and so I didn't think that it was out of place.
A great little flick with really strong performances.