Athlete A (2020)

Athlete A (2020)

PG-13

netflix

The documentary event of the year

8.4

Movie

United States of America
English
Documentary
2020
BONNI COHEN, FEMALE DIRECTOR
Géza Poszar, Gina Nichols, Jen Sey
104 min

What it's about

Follow the Indianapolis Star reporters that broke the story about USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar's abuse and hear from gymnasts.

The take

This groundbreaking documentary follows the USA Olympics sexual abuse case that made headlines in 2015. Through interviews with Olympians, their families, and investigative reporters, it’s also a documentary on the overall culture of abuse in gymnastics: sexual, physical, and emotional.

In one scene from the 1996 Olympics, gold medalist Kerri Strug has to run, vault, and land - all with a severe foot injury that was covered up by her coaches. She does this twice, limping between attempts and crawling off the mat on the second, crying. Meanwhile, her family, her coaches, the spectators - the World - is celebrating.

When she’s carried off, it’s Larry Nassar, the pedophile at the center of the documentary, who carries her.

Athlete A is groundbreaking exactly because it illustrates that the problem is not only with one doctor, or the 54 coaches who were also found guilty of sexual abuse, or the morally bankrupt leadership of USA Gymastics; it’s also about what went so wrong with society to see the abuse of young girls as cause for celebration.

Comments

Add a comment

Your name

Your comment

UP NEXT 

UP NEXT 

UP NEXT 

Secrets of the Neanderthals (2024)

This plodding, unenergetic documentary sees neanderthals and humans as two branches on the same tree

6.0

Uncropped (2024)

A delightful documentary that doubles as a biography of a singular artist and a celebration of a bygone era

7.9

La Belle Noiseuse (1991)

A sensual, spellbinding masterpiece depicting the creative process and its muse

8.1

Leave the World Behind (2023)

Shyamalan meets Black Mirror in this hugely entertaining, visually inventive apocalyptic thriller with a killer ending

8.2

Hail Satan? (2019)

Forget everything you think you know about the Satanic Temple

8.0

Wind River (2017)

Sicario's screenwriter directs this story of murder in an Indigenous reserve

9.4

Incendies (2011)

Part melodrama, part war thriller, Incendies is gorgeous and heartbreaking from the first scene

9.9

Power (2024)

A highly informative but ultimately flat account of the history of policing in America

6.9

Mona Lisa (1986)

A neo-noir love story that dives deep into London’s underworld

7.7

Wild Tales (2014)

Co-produced by Pedro Almodóvar, this tumultuous Argentine anthology film tests the limits of human sanity when pushed to the extremes – and will also test yours.

9.9

Curated by humans, not algorithms.

agmtw logo

© 2024 agoodmovietowatch, all rights reserved.