About a year ago, I had a podcast with a buddy of mine. This podcast featured us taking historical events or notorious peoples and re-enacting their stories as they "actually happened". The way we'd prepare for these podcasts is we'd do a bit of research on the event or person, make an outline of the important moments we needed to get through in the podcast and then improvise the rest. Well, our podcast, which we found particularly hilarious, had only about eight total fans, so it kind of fizzled and died. However, one of the last episodes we did was about Tonya Harding. It was one of my personal favorite episodes because most of the comedy came from the actual situation itself. The only added touch were the ridiculous voices and added character traits we added to the people involved (the best episodes were ones that were outrageous already before we injected our own brand of comedy). After doing research on Tonya Harding, I basically came to the conclusion that she was just a nut. After the whole "Nancy Kerrigan incident", she went on to become a female boxer, sell a sex tape, and attempt to beat the land speed record in a car all to make money. We presented her as this nut-job who could hardly form a sentence, sounded constantly intoxicated, and could not wrap her head around any of these career choices being "crazy". I don't often apologize for my comedy. I believe that if you're not just picking on one type of person, or saying inflammatory shit for the sake of hurting others, all in comedy is fair game. But, after watching I, Tonya I actually do feel pretty terrible about it now. I guess the silver lining here is that it was heard by only, like, four people so it didn't do much damage.
I, Tonya is a truly heartbreaking story told in a very unique and, well... funny way. After seeing the film I had no idea how little I knew about Harding's actual skating career. I had no idea that she (portrayed by Margot Robbie) was the first, and only, American to perform a triple axle. I had no idea that because she was too poor to afford a "proper" costume, she was never given fair treatment by judges. I had no idea that she never received a medal at the Olympics. You hear the name, associate it with "the incident", but just assume she was a big name beforehand because she was an Olympic medalist. She came in fourth. This is only part of what the movie shows. It also shows the countless amounts of abuse thrown at Harding throughout her lifetime. Whether it was the mental abuse given by her mother (Allison Janney), which also turned into physical abuse, or the serious physical abuse given to her by her boyfriend turned husband Jeff (Sebastian Stan). Tonya Harding had one of the hardest lives I think a professional athlete could come from. And for her to rise up and achieve what she achieved is pretty remarkable in itself. The film doesn't hold back from this either. Tonya is belittled by her mother, who I'm pretty certain is physically incapable of cracking a smile. Then, she goes home to her husband and she is thrown around the apartment, smacked in the face, punched, slammed into walls and mirrors, has a gun pulled on her, you name it. This is all spliced between interviews with everyone involved twenty years later (where different perspectives offer different takes on the events - however, it's easy to discern who the unreliable storytellers are).
Director Craig Gillespie has crafted a very unique biopic. We've been given the bio formula umpteen times and we essentially know how they go. Show the childhood, show the emotional toll on said important person, show how they rise above, show how they backslide, show how they have serious faults, show how they overcome said faults, show how they have succeeded. The end. What we've been given is a nice spin on convention here and shown a movie that incorporates bias and moments that may or may not have happened and exaggerations and truth all in the same movie. We'll get a scene and either cut to an interview where someone claims "that never really happened", or in the middle of the scene, they'll break the fourth wall and give us some information. Most of it is played for laughs, but the laughs are juxtaposed by the horror happening on screen. For example, Harding's bodyguard, a human lump by the name of Shawn is portrayed as a goofy idiot who lives with his mother. And even though he is, in fact, a goofy idiot (with less than four brain cells still active) who lives with his mom... he's a main contributor in the whole Nancy Kerrigan debacle which directly contributes to the ruining of Tonya Harding's life. And it's BECAUSE he's this goofy idiot that it manages to work out that way. So while you're laughing along with the ridiculous situations happening, you're crying a little bit inside knowing how much it is affecting this person who has already tried several times to escape a life of abuse and self-destruction. It's a fantastic contrast in a fantastic movie.
Everyone is great in the film, but the two who stand out are Janney and especially Robbie. Allison Janney is one of the greatest worst mothers in the history of cinema. The stuff that comes out of her mouth is so vulgar and hateful, you have to laugh at it from an outsider's perspective. But the icyness of her character, especially as a mother to someone who truly needs an ally, it's downright tragic. There are moments when you expect her to break from her character and give us a smile and a hug, but it never happens. She's cold and domineering and could've easily been a parent-biopic-trope, but somehow transcends convention due to good writing and a great performance. As far as Robbie is concerned, for the last few months I have been advocating for Frances McDormand to get the Best Actress Oscar for Three Billboards, however Robbie may have won me over. There's already stiff competition this year in the Best Actress category with McDormand, Sally Hawkins, Saoirse Ronan, Meryl Streep, Michelle Williams, Judi Dench and possibly Jessica Chastain, but Robbie gives such a terrific turn as Harding, that she's going to give all these women a run for their money. She's a firecracker in this film and gives a portrayal stronger than would normally be expected for a film about Tonya Harding. At first, she's a self-proclaimed redneck who, on the surface, (and if you've done basic research on her history) appears to be a little nuts. However, due to a life of constant abuse and being given an unfair disadvantage in her skating career, you start to realize that even though a lot of her behavior is self-destroying, it's at the very least understandable. Robbie does something with Harding I didn't think possible-- she creates empathy. And she knocks it out of the park. The movie is terrific, but it wouldn't have been as strong without Robbie at the forefront.
I, Tonya has somewhat of a sick sense of humor about its subject matter, considering how dark everything actually is. And it's truly sad everything that culminates around the events leading to the outcome of Harding's life, but Gillespie and company do honor Harding and give her a fair shot at explaining her role in everything. And while it appears that she isn't as much to blame as we all remember her being, she's still culpable. The film poses the question, though, of whether her culpability should've really led to a lifetime ban for a person without an education, without any other skill set other than skating. By the end of the film, you're not laughing like you once were, but feeling for Tonya and resenting the fact you've harbored unfounded notions about her for many years. It's truly a great biopic and one of the best movies of the year.
A
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