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MOVIE REVIEW: I, Tonya

Garth Cremona (RIP)

The true story of Olympic Ice Skater Tonya Harding.  Tonya made a name for herself on the ice by being the first American Woman to land a Triple Axel, that might be the wrong thing, also off the ice by having the dumbest people on her side who tried to help by crippling her main rival.

Back in the 1990’s I was partly addicted to the night-time shows of Jay Leno and David Letterman.  There were usually broadcast here in Ireland a few days after them showing in the USA.  I loved the jovial nature of the interviews and the monologues.  The other part of my admiration for the shows was seeing the news from America and also the years of the OJ trial.  The part that I didn’t know too much of but learned more about was the Tonya Harding story.  They painted her as the main ringleader in the assault on Nancy Kerrigan.

First, this is by far the best performance that Margot Robbie has ever given, she totally becomes the Tonya that you’ve seen on documentaries and interviews.  Tonya is eager to win, and not shy about finding out why she didn’t get the points that she deserved.  Robbie can do that without blinking, she switches from the ultimate competitor to the aggressive single-minded monster within the blink of an eye.  Joining Robbie is Sebastian Stan as her on/off husband Jeff, and it’s so nice to see Stan doing a role that brings out the talents that he has, rather than just looking broody.  They have a relationship which would be rated a tragedy if it wasn’t so utterly stupid, both sides claim that it was the other who was violent to them, and the brilliant way that the film is shot gives both sides of the story.  While Stan and Robbie are amazing in their roles, it’s Allison Janney as LaVona Harding, Tonya’s Mother, that steals the show.  She’s channelling Mommie Dearest meeting white trash America and although we’re watching child abuse it’s just a pleasure to watch.

As the idiocy of the conspiracy takes over the movie it almost becomes a farce rather than a biopic, but it is at its heart, one of the best biopic’s that I’ve ever seen.  They play on the humour of the stupidity and get you up to speed with the story in case you’ve never heard of it before.  Showing the elitism of the Skating World which purposely kept Tonya’s scores at low-level as she didn’t look like the other girls.  Then showing the stupid idiots that Tonya surrounded herself with, including her Husband and his friend who called himself her bodyguard.  It’s a balanced way to show the facts of the film without harping on the incident.

I never expect to laugh at biopics, usually because there is some tragedy or a lot of hardship before reaching the goal, but here I laughed a lot.  The pure lunacy of the incident with Nancy, along with the dumbest reasoning, adding in the amazing performances all around give I, Tonya the razor-sharp edge that lift it up from the realms of your average biopic.  This is a film that can be hard to watch because of the domestic abuse and the child abuse, it all counts towards Tonya’s behaviour, and the decisions that she made.  If you’re thinking of skipping this then you’re just as big of an idiot as those who conspired to hurt Kerrigan.

[yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]

Director: Craig Gillespie
Writer: Steven Rogers
Stars: Margot Robbie, Sebastian Stan, Allison Janney & more…  See full cast & crew

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Garth Cremona (RIP)
Comic book creator and movie reviewer. You can find out more at www.dublinwriter.com
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