Movie: I, Tonya (2017) Caution; Spoiler Alert

 I, Tonya

Came out; 2017

Time; 1 hour 59 Minutes

Watched: HBO Max

Rated: R for pervasive language, violence and some sexual content/nudity

IMDB Rating; 7.5/10

Caution; Spoiler Alert

Staring.

Margot Robbie as Tonya

Sebastian Stan as Jeff

Allison Janney as LaVona

Bobby Cannavale as Martin Maddox

Caitlin Carver as Nancy Kerrigan

Mckenna Grace as Tonya (8-12 years)

Story Line;

Pushed into skating by her domineering and abusive mother, Lavona Golden, child prodigy Tonya Harding never got a break. Tonya's life has been a roller-coaster ride, from her tumultuous relationship with her first boyfriend, Jeff Gillooly, to her crushing defeat in the 1992 Winter Olympics. Despite being the first American figure skater to perform the notoriously challenging triple axel perfectly in competition, her abundant talent alone wasn't enough. After all, no one will ever forget the infamous incident involving her friend and fellow skater, Nancy Kerrigan. In an attempt to move beyond her troubled past, Tonya's last opportunity to prove herself arose during the 1994 Winter Olympics. Both loved and hated, Tonya Harding's talent and skill have impacted figure skating.

Thoughts:

This was actually much better than I was expecting. Margot Robbie is of course a star on her own but to tell the story of Tonya Harding had to have been a hard role to play.

I remember when this all happened. It was pretty crazy at the time but this story but it from Tonya's angle. They broke the 4^th wall a few times during the movie and it ended with actual footage.

It's amazing how we can see the story in the media but there is a whole different story on the other end

CAUTION; Spoiler Alert

The movie is based on interviews with Tonya and Jeff. Tonya says that she is a real person, and never apologized for being poor and being a redneck.

In 1970s Portland, Oregon, four-year-old Tonya Harding (Margot Robbie) is forced to ice skate by her abusive mother, LaVona Golden (Allison Janney). Tonya is LaVona's 5th child from her 4th husband. Tonya has a natural gift for ice skating and within 6 months she won her first competition. As Tonya grows up, LaVona takes her out of school to focus on her skating career, and she trains extensively under the tutelage of coach Diane Rawlinson (Julianne Nicholson). Tonya is in constant terror of her mother who is abusive, tough, drunk and not a good role model for the other kids. LaVona never said anything encouraging to Tonya and nothing Tonya did on the ice was ever good enough. LaVona was seen hitting her with a hairbrush and once did not allow Tonya to urinate and she ended up peeing in her suit on ice. LaVona claims that Tonya skated better when she was enraged.

Into her adulthood, Tonya rapidly becomes one of the best figure skaters in the United States. Against her mother's wishes, she begins dating the abusive Jeff Gillooly (Sebastian Stan). Jeff starts off as a cute boyfriend, but soon starts abusing and hitting Tonya. For Tonya, it was her first and only boyfriend since she was 15 years old, and she didn't know any better and she believed Jeff when he said, "it's your fault". Jeff claims in his interviews that he never hit Tonya, and in fact it was Tonya who fired a gun at him.

In 1986 Tonya competes at the Skate America event in Portland and doesn't win. Her mother again abuses her for not trying hard enough at competitions and throws a knife at her, which hits her. Tonya promptly moves out and in with Jeff. Tonya consistently gets average scores despite out skating all other skaters in competitions. One judge tells her that they also score on "presentation" alluding to the poorly put together costumes that Tonya stitches for herself. Meanwhile Tonya marries Jeff. Tonya fires Diane and starts working with Dody Teachman (Bojana Novakovic) as coach.

In the figure skating community, Tonya continually faces prejudice for being "white trash", regardless of her skill (the only female figure skater to ever successfully complete two triple axle jumps. The first time at the 1991 US skating nationals) and consistency of winning. After the first triple axle, everything changed. Tonya started winning and became famous. Jeff became jealous and started hitting Tonya more than ever. Tonya moves out of Jeff's house as she had had enough. Nancy Kerrigan (Caitlin Carver) was Tonya's friend and fellow skater. Nancy and Tonya were friends and even roommates, but the media loved Nancy and hated Tonya. Jeff pursues Tonya to Sun Valley (where she had gone for a competition) and wins her back. But as soon as Tonya moves back with Jeff, her skating goes bad, and she starts missing the simpler jumps. The real reason was her weight gain because of her binge drinking and junk food habits.

At the 1992 Winter Olympics, Tonya fails to stick her landings (she claims that her skate was broken in practice, and it was welded back a little off and so all her landings were off) and finishes fourth. As Jeff continues to abuse Tonya, she divorces him. Defeated, she takes a job as a waitress, but Diane reaches out to Tonya and convinces her to train for the 1994 Winter Olympics. This was a rare case when the winter Olympics were held after 2 years and not the usual gap of 4 years. She performs well but still gets poor scores. She confronts a judge about her scores; he explains that Tonya's image is not wholesome enough and that she refuses to play along. Tonya approaches her mother for help, but is scolded and rebuffed, leading Tonya to reluctantly ask Jeff for support. On the day of her November 1993 competition at the Northwest Pacific Regional Championships in Portland, Tonya receives a death threat and chooses not to compete.

Realizing that he can sabotage Tonya's competition, Jeff instructs his friend Shawn Eckardt (Paul Walter Hauser) to mail death threats to Tonya's rival, Nancy Kerrigan. Jeff pays Shawn $1000 to do so. Tonya makes a phone call trying to locate Nancy's training arena and her practice times. Jeff claims that Tonya knew about the plan to mail threat letters to Nancy.

But then Shawn demands more money from Jeff, which he refuses and wants to call the whole thing off as the plan was only to mail threat letters. Shawn hires two inept crooks (Derrick Smith (Anthony Reynolds) and Shane Stant (Ricky Russert)) to injure Nancy after a practice session in Detroit. In January 1994, Shawn's henchmen strike Nancy's knee, and she cannot compete at the next day's National competition. The hired henchmen are arrested based on CCTV footage outside of Nancy's training venue.

Shawn's bragging quickly leads the FBI to him. He blames Jeff, who is horrified to learn that Shawn instigated the entire affair in order to draw attention. Shawn even tells Jeff that he was the one who sent the death threat to Tonya. Tonya qualifies for the Olympic team but realizes she will be found guilty by association. She goes to the FBI and reports what Jeff and Shawn did, but they show her interview transcript to Jeff after his arrest, and he races home to confront her. She briefly speaks to Jeff from behind a locked door, then climbs out the window, leaving him for good. Jeff later implicates Tonya by saying she knew beforehand about the attack.

LaVona visits Tonya and offers her kind words; however, when she asks if Tonya had prior knowledge of the attack, Tonya realizes that LaVona is wearing a wire and throws her out. Jeff, Shawn, and the henchmen are charged, and Tonya's hearing is postponed until after the Olympics. Tonya finishes eighth and Nancy wins the silver medal. When Oksana Baiul (Cassidy Balkcom) edges Nancy out for the gold and the first-ever Olympic medal for independent Ukraine, Tonya accuses Nancy of being a poor sport. Tonya avoids jail but is banned from competitive figure-skating for life. Heartbroken, she begs the judge to give her jail time instead of taking away the one thing she knows how to do; the judge refuses.

Jeff acknowledges that he ruined Tonya's career. He changes his name, opens a hair salon, divorces, and remarries. LaVona moves to Washington state and has no contact with Tonya. Tonya remarries, divorces, takes up professional boxing, and becomes a landscaper, house painter, and deck builder. She now lives happily with her third husband and their seven-year-old son. Text at the end states that Tonya wants people to know that she is a good mother.