It's taken a while to write this review, because I'm still not sure what I've watched and what I make of it. Like The Usual Suspects it's not until you get to the ending that you realise that you're no further forward in fully understanding what exactly has gone on.
In real life, Tony Harding is an Olympic figure skater who (amongst other figure skating firsts) became the first American woman to successfully complete a triple axel jump in competition. She was also, in some way, involved in an attack on Nancy Kerrigan - her team mate and rival. This much is true.
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| Film is called I, Tonya. That's definitely true as well. |
It's a difficult watch. Where the trailer suggested a light and breezy account of a tough young woman overcoming the odds and winning over her critics, the truth is that there's little light and breezy about it. It's a difficult watch as Tonya is repeatedly abused both verbally and physically, first by her mother and then by her husband. By the end of the film we have watched her being struck repeatedly, stabbed and shot. The hurdles are numerous - from the figure skating judges who are dismissive of her rock routines and rhinestones for not being "feminine" enough, to the authorities who seem uninterested in the crying, bleeding woman in the car as her husband is pulled over for speeding and don't seem to follow up on the repeated breaches of restraining orders. Even her skating coach seems to ignore the fingerprint welts on Tonya's arms and yet another black eye. Margot Robbie's prickly performance makes one thing clear - Tonya Harding can't win. Everything is too stacked against her. So she becomes difficult, and unlikeable, and abrasive. And the hurdles get higher. After the Kerrigan attack, she is given 3 years probation, 500 hours community service, a $100,000 fine, stripped of her figure skating titles and banned for life from participation in figure skating in any form. Comparatively, Eckhardt served 14 months in prison. Gillooly served 2 years. An incredulous Tonya notes, "Nancy gets hit once and the whole world shits. For me, that's an everyday occurrence."
So what makes the difference? Is it because she's a woman? Partially - note the disparity in punishments between the men (who were there and carried out the attack) and Tonya (who wasn't there but may have been involved in some form of conspiracy). Is it because she's not considered conventionally feminine? Partially - "we also grade on presentation" notes a judge, evaluating Tonya's handmade costumes, meaning that although Tonya is technically the better skater, Kerrigan's artistic interpretation counts for more. It's not enough to be good enough - you have to be pretty while you're doing it. "She looks as though she chops wood every morning" notes one detractor. "That's because she does chop wood every morning" snaps her mother. Is it because nobody wants to be on her side because her mother makes it impossible to be friends with Tonya? Partially - "Don't talk to her" yells LaVona at 4 year old Tonya. "She's not your friend, she's your competitor". Which seems to be how LaVona sees everyone in the world. Is it because she's poor? Partially - as Tonya is widely mocked for her fitness routine largely based on the montage from Rocky IV. All of these things and more make Tonya Harding unlikeable to the outside world. The world does not root for an unlikeable person. The world generally tries not to engage with an unlikeable person.
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| No Tonya, you look fine... |
"And you", spits Tonya as she directly addresses the audience - "you're all my attackers too" - a charge that should have cut deep, after a lot of tonal flipflopping, and a shaky script is a bit of a jump that doesn't quite land.
I can't quite place why it doesn't quite work for me. The constant fourth-wall breaking gets distracting, and breaks the tension rather than building it. We don't see enough of Tonya in relation to the figure skating world, so it never really seems like she's out of place until someone deliberately says that she is. And although we see the struggle of her relationships, we don't see the value of anything - we can't fully grasp that figure skating is her absolute everything until it is taken from her and Robbie has to painstakingly explain the consequence and unfairness of that to the audience. And although we're invited to laugh along, we're mainly laughing at the horror of Tonya's situation, which is part of the issue to begin with.
The acting, particularly by Robbie and Janney needs to be commended. Robbie plays a fine line of making Tonya as brash and sharp as possible, while making it possible to still root for her. When Tonya is happy the audience is happy. Janney is entirely deserving of her Best Supporting Actress Oscar, and the closing shots of the real LaVona in her fur coat wearing, chain smoking, bird-toting glory are a sudden shocking realisation that Janney has turned in a note-perfect performance. A sharper script would have helped this score higher for technical merit, but the artistic interpretation by the female leads are the real crowd pleasers.
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| Scary birds |
- Are we laughing with Tonya? Or at her? Or both?
- LaVona's bird - that really deserves to win some sort of acting Oscar (which actually exist - they're called the Pawscars)
- I wonder what Nancy Kerrigan's take on this is - hers is a voice oddly missing from the film.
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