I, TONYA

US, 2017, 120 minutes, Colour.
Margot Robbie, Sebastien Stan, Allison Janney, Julianne Nicholson, Paul Walter Hauser, Bobby Cannavale, Bogdana Novakovitz, Caitlin Carver, Maizie Smith, Mckenna Grace.
Directed by Craig Gillespie.


This is a strongly autobiographical title. And the Tonya is champion ice skater, Tonya Harding – who, in the 1990s, was known as a determined competitor and who was responsible for paying injury to her main rival, Nancy Kerrigan. With this film, this aspect of the reputation will happen all over again.

With the I in the title, Tonya is telling her own story, and she does it straight to camera, sitting in her kitchen in later years, confiding in the audience, reminiscing, becoming angry, and always insisting that anything that happened to her was not her fault. At other times, during the film, she will also turn to camera tell us all about it.

In fact, other characters also talk to camera. The main person in her life was her mother, an embittered woman, taking out her angers on her daughter, living through her daughter and her skating talent but always undermining, often physically violent, badmouthing her daughter. Allison Janney, whom audiences have admired for decades, notably for her performance in the television series, The West Wing, has already won the Golden Globe award for Best Supporting Actress and the same award from the Screen Actors Guild. It is an extraordinarily intense portrait of a monstrous woman, absorbed in herself, seeing everything in connection with herself, but also absorbed, up close or at a distance, with her daughter. It is a performance worth watching.

But also, well worth watching, is the performance of Margot Robbie as Tonya. Two talented little girls portray her when she was small, determined, and outskilling girls at her skating who are older. She tells us that she always loved skating, that she knew nothing else, that this was her life. Margot Robbie has to portray Tonya as a teenager, as a young adult, the crisis in her life and the attack on Nancy Kerrigan coming when she was only 23. Margot Robbie embodies Tonya, as a character, as a redneck, which she claims she is, as a moody young woman, and as a competitive performer, Margot Robbie doing a great deal of the skating herself.

The other person in Tonya’s life was Jeff Gilhooly. He is played here by Sebastian Stan, another strong performance, a friendly young man, in a relationship with the teenage Tonya, ambitious for her, but also prone to irrational and violent outbursts. This is a tempestuous relationship, a fierce example of domestic violence. And her mother continually declares she never liked him.

Jeff Gilhooly has a friend, Shawn (Paul Walter Hauser), a large and oafish young man, not too many brains to bless himself with, who acts as Tonya’s bodyguard and is the brains (or lack of brains) in going beyond Jeff Gilhooly’s aim to frighten Nancy Kerrigan but employing an ignorant friend who bashes the skater’s knee.

The action after the event of the bashing reveals Jeff Is Becoming more and more desperate, the police investigation, Shawn’s ignorant denials, the arrest of the actual basher, Shawn setting up Jeff at midnight at a diner to get him to confess… It is hard to tell how much Tonya actually knew or discovered after the event. Nevertheless, she perseveres in competitive skating, preparing for the 1992 Winter Olympics, making impression with her skills, though always alienating the team of judges by her personality, by her presentation, by her attitudes.

Comes the moment at the Olympics…

In the epilogue to the film, it is revealed that Tonya became a boxer, another violent sport. A postscript indicates that she has settled down somewhat and, in fact, accompanied Margot Robbie to the Golden globes.

The credits images are worth seeing, impressive scenes of the actual Tonya Harding and her skating – and a glimpse her actual mother looking exactly the way Allison Janney portrays her in the film

A slice of American life – with many bitter tastes.

1. The title? Focus on? Tonya speaking to camera? Of the characters? Her story, her testimony?

2. Audience knowledge of Tonya Harding? In the 1990s? The incident with Nancy Kerrigan? Later?

3. The picture of the early years, Tonya as a child, living in the city, a home, the 1970s and 1980s? The skating rink’s? Shops? Diners? Competitions and training? The musical score? The music for the skating events?

4. The portrait of Tonya, sitting in the kitchen years later, Frank and blunt comments, her being a redneck? As a little girl, her ability to skate better than others, winning competitions, her mother’s demands on coaches? Her relationship with her mother, the hard mother, supervising her, controlling, her bitterness? Pushy, with the coaches, judges? The effect on Tonya?

5. The mother, Allison Janney’s performance, her appearance, hair, glasses, hard aspect, the bird on her shoulder? Her clothes? With Tonya, at home, bitterness, yet active in promoting Tonya, with the coaches, the demands? Cigarettes? Work her work as a waitress? Pushing Tonya, physically violent, the effect? Are watching the competitions?

6. Jeff Gilhooly in himself, talking to camera, with Tonya, in love, the sexual relationship, her age, living together? His violent outbursts, physical, emotional? The effect on Tonya? Her mother disliking him? The decision to marry?

7. Their married life, Tonya and her skating, Jeff and his work, the continued violence, Tonya’s reaction, leading to the divorce? If his presence in her life?

8. Shawn, friendly with Jeff, being Tonya’s bodyguard? Self-promotion, lacking brains?

9. Diana, her skill as a coach, the mother confronting her, her helping Tonya, through the years, her being fired, her returning at the Olympics?

10. Nancy Kerrigan, personality, skills, friendship with Tonya, sharing accommodation with her? The contrast with Tonya not being light, the judges severe on her, low scores, criticisms of her presentation? The rivalry?

11. The death threat to Tonya? Her reaction? Jeff and the threats? As engineered by Jeff? Shawn and his thug, bashing Nancy Kerrigan, the reaction? The police interrogations? Shawn and his initiative, Jeff not knowing? His lack of savvy? The thug, ignorant? The police interrogating Jeff, the midnight run to the rendezvous at the diner? Jeff and his being cautious?

12. The media response, to Tonya, to her mother?

13. Tonya and the alienation from her mother, her mother at the competition and paying the Heckler? Work as a waitress, watching on the TV? The visit to her daughter, expressions of love, her wanting the truth wearing a wire?

14. The competition, Tonya and her practice, her skills and manoeuvres beyond other Americans? The new coach? Returning to Diana? The possibility for the Olympics, training, exercise? The squad?

15. The Olympic moment, her nervousness, the laces and tying them up, the time pressure, her nerves? Appeal to the judges? Her performance, stopping?

16. Her skills, the only American performer for special manoeuvres?

17. The court, the judge in his sentence, that she was not to skate? A desperate appeal? Taking on boxing?

18. The further information about her life and activities?

19. The sequences of the real Tanya and her skating, competition? The visuals of Jeff, her mother?

20. Truth or interpretation?