Athlete A
As last year’s major
documentaries are being sifted through for Oscar glory, Bonni Cohen and
Jon Shenk’s tale of sexual misconduct within the USA Gymnastics’ body
is gaining traction.
The sign of
a good documentary is the capacity to engage a viewer completely indifferent to
its subject matter. It is also the ability to tell a really good story. Athlete A, with its access to key
players, wide-ranging video footage (both global and covert) and its multi-layered
take on its theme, is about as good as it gets. You don’t have to be a salivating
devotee of gymnastics to be sucked into the drama at the heart of Bonni Cohen
and Jon Shenk's shocking film.
This is the
story of Maggie Nichols, a teenage girl from Minnesota who, on a full athletic
scholarship, enrolled at the University of Oklahoma to become the first representative
of Oklahoma to perform a gym slam (a perfect score of 10.00 on every discipline).
She was a star (obviously) but, two years before that accomplishment, in 2015,
she had become a victim within the closed ranks of the gymnastic establishment.
Aged 19, she retired from elite gymnastics altogether, focusing instead on the
sport at college level. Maggie Nichols may have the ‘title role’ in Athlete A, but she is just one casualty in
what turned out to be a culture of systemic abuse of teenage girls.
As the space
race between Russia and the USA technically concluded in 1975, a new rivalry
began in 1976 when Nadia Comăneci, aged 14, became the first gymnast to be
awarded a perfect score of 10.0 at the Olympic Games. Although Romanian, Comăneci
was a product of the Communist Bloc and her success, fine-tuned through a
rigorous training routine, affected a sea change, in spite of the girl’s dour
demeanour. Formerly a sport reserved for grown women, the activity became a magnet
for over-achieving pre-pubescent girls (and pushy parents) the world over. Consequently,
little innocents with stars in their eyes suffered unimaginable mental,
emotional and physical torture in order to achieve their dreams of world
domination. So, who better to assuage their tears and torn ligaments than the
avuncular human haven that was Larry Nassar, doctor, osteopath and virtual
saint?
Recalling Tom
McCarthy’s Oscar-winning Spotlight
(2015) in its forensic exploration of institutionalised sexual abuse, Athlete A peels off its narrative layers
with skilful, low-key acuity. Like Maggie’s parents and the investigative
reporters working for The Indianapolis
Star, nobody could really believe the full extent of the abuse and the
cover-up surrounding it.
A frequent
on-screen presence, Maggie Nichols’ father, John, fights back signs of emotional
heartbreak with a rictus grin as he chips in with his own testimony: “Steve
Penny [CEO of USA Gymnastics] would always tell me: ‘Don’t worry about Maggie.
We got Maggie.’ So why would I not believe him? You know, we’re talking about
USA Gymnastics. We’re talking US Olympics.” But even as John Nichols musters a
smile for the camera, he cannot mask the moist hurt in his eyes. However, it’s
his daughter, our Athlete A, now aged 23, who sums up the irony of her story,
seemingly without rancour: “I started gymnastics when I was three-years-old,
because I was always climbing out of my crib. So my parents put me into it [gymnastics],
just to be in a safer environment.”
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Featuring Maggie Nichols, Jennifer Sey, Rachael
Denhollander, Jamie Dantzscher, John Manly, Mark Alesia, Jessica Howard, Steve
Berta, Tim Evans, Mike Jacki, Marisa Kwiatkowski, Andrea Munford, Gina Nichols,
John Nichols, Angela Povilaitis, Geza Pozsar, Tracee Talavera, and (archive
footage) Nadia Comăneci (not smiling), Ronald Reagan, Nicolae Ceausescu, Larry
Nassar, Mary Lou Retton, Kerri Strug.
Dir Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk, Pro Serin Marshall, Julie Parker Benello
and Jennifer Sey, Ex Pro Richard
Berge, Regina K. Scully, Barbara and Eric Dobkin, Patty Quillen, Ann W. Lovell,
Jennifer Westphal, Joe Plummer, Debbie McLeod, Jay K. Sears, Ken and Christina
Nolan, Jim and Susan Swartz, Dan Cogan, Geralyn White Dreyfous and Jenny Raskin,
Ph Jon Shenk, Ed Don Bernier, Music
Jeff Beal.
Actual Films/Impact Partners/Artemis Rising Foundation/Meadow Fund and Dobkin Family Foundation/Chicago Media Project/Grant Me the Wisdom Productions-Netflix.
103 mins. USA. 2020. Rel: 24 June 2020. Available on Netflix. Cert. 15.