As someone who was a freshly born infant from across the pond when all this kneecapping was going down, this was my first introduction to Tonya Harding and her very public life. A bleak tale of abuse, squashed talent and the tabloid machine that leeches on these very public, vocal stars, I, Tonya is every bit as slick production wise as it is heartbreaking and depressing. It's pretty devastating to see someone of such talent get ripped down and abused by those closest to her, culminating in the loss of the only thing she'd ever truly loved. Margot really swings for the fences in some of the latter scenes, namely the sentencing and the changing room before the big performance. Something about the deathly silence, dark vignetting and her smiling through the tears struck a chord with me; beautifully done scene. Not completely faultless however, as some of the deepfaking during the skating scenes is pretty woeful and really took me out of the moment with how glaring they were. That and 15 year old Margot Robbie and Sebastian Stan is fine for Twitter memes and driveby Letterboxd reviews, but it's pretty jarring in a movie that, while comedic at times, is telling a fairly serious, dramatic narrative. Are these nitpicks? Maybe, but they were definitely enough to bring this down from an 8 to a high 7, personally.
Review by XiofireBlockedParent2023-11-18T23:38:33Z
As someone who was a freshly born infant from across the pond when all this kneecapping was going down, this was my first introduction to Tonya Harding and her very public life. A bleak tale of abuse, squashed talent and the tabloid machine that leeches on these very public, vocal stars, I, Tonya is every bit as slick production wise as it is heartbreaking and depressing. It's pretty devastating to see someone of such talent get ripped down and abused by those closest to her, culminating in the loss of the only thing she'd ever truly loved. Margot really swings for the fences in some of the latter scenes, namely the sentencing and the changing room before the big performance. Something about the deathly silence, dark vignetting and her smiling through the tears struck a chord with me; beautifully done scene.
Not completely faultless however, as some of the deepfaking during the skating scenes is pretty woeful and really took me out of the moment with how glaring they were. That and 15 year old Margot Robbie and Sebastian Stan is fine for Twitter memes and driveby Letterboxd reviews, but it's pretty jarring in a movie that, while comedic at times, is telling a fairly serious, dramatic narrative. Are these nitpicks? Maybe, but they were definitely enough to bring this down from an 8 to a high 7, personally.