This is a tough one, and it certainly has raised some eyebrows in its admittedly one sided telling of the Tonya Harding story. The one persuasive moment in it all is at the end where there are out takes of interviews with the actual players, and darned if they don't sound spot on for the portrayals in the movie.
Allison Janney is flat out amazing as Tonya's mother. Her non-stop spewing of verbal abuse interspersed with chain smoking and the occasional throwing of an object or two that are easily dodged but malevolent none-the-less is awe-inspiring in its sheer awfulness. That is a mother that would make you more sympathetic to a mass murderer. It doesn't excuse the crime, but you can see how damaging it would be to grow up with that.
Margot Robbie has a lot of the real Tonya's mannerisms down, and the depiction of the figure skating community as classist and emphasizing beauty and grace over athleticism is dead on. Does that excuse the crime? Absolutely not, but it does go a ways to seeing why it might have happened. There are Academy Award nominations in here, and we will see how that plays out.
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