By Glenn Dunks
It has become somewhat unkind to describe a documentary as old fashioned or traditional. It seems to be that talking heads intercutting a single, linear story is somehow considered by some to be stodgy and boring. If you watch enough of them, you see recreations and animations and all sorts of gimmicky tricks to, I suppose, dazzle the viewer into thinking they are watching something that is more ‘cinematic’ than it is (whatever such a term may mean to you). They don’t always work, and in those time that they do in fact not work it can often harm a film, distracting from what could have been a, yes, simple, but usually better film. You could call it old fashioned or traditional.
Thanks heavens then that director Erin Lee Carr didn’t try any of that nonsense in the HBO documentary At the Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastic Scandal.
Even its title is so meat and potatoes that those who expect works of non-fiction to have evolved beyond the classical form will probably zone out just hearing the name. But Carr’s movie is one of such harrowing despair that anything other than clear, direct, unfussy filmmaking would have been all wrong.
If it sounds like I’m stalling, letting my mind drift on matters of critical discourse and cinematic interpretation then, well, I am guilty as charged. For At the Heart of Gold is indeed a hard watch and it’s not one that anybody ought to dwell. Anybody who has followed the news in the last few years will no doubt know the story just by the words “USA gymnastics scandal” – three words that hardly do the crimes of Larry Nassar and his enablers justice. It is a story of abuse, both physically, mentally and structurally, that seems unfathomable, hard to believe as it unfolds gracefully yet directly over 88 compelling minutes.
Carr – daughter of New York Times’ David Carr, so it’s not surprising there is a certain clinical investigative journalist bluntness to its escalating tragedy – is wise to focus on the survivors rather than the perpetrator. Women like Rachael Denhollander, Chelsea Zerfas, Trinea Gonczar, Amanda Thomashow and many more who bravely tell their stories. Carr lets them speak and express their thoughts and their misgivings and their own regrets. In the film’s later passages, we see victim testimonies from the sentencing trial of Nasser by the women, many still of competing age, that are hard viewing for us, but an important symbol of catharsis if even just a small amount of it.
Airing on HBO, the documentary would pair well with Jennifer Fox’s The Tale, in which Laura Dern’s character comes to a later-in-life realization about what was committed against her as a child. It’s a theme that runs through many of stories in At the Heart of Gold. Carr has built a testament to the tenacity of these women, telling a necessary story that proves you don’t need flare and pomp when you have the faces and voices and a story that needs to be told.
A glance at the Harvey Weinstein doc Untouchable only confirms this. A documentary that, in its best moments, simply lingers on the survivors and sexual abuse and misconduct, leaving in the deafening silent moments that come all too frequently as stories of Weinstein’s grotesque misuses of power fill the screen. But director Ursula Macfarlane too often interrupts their testimonials with annoying intercut snippets of seedy corridors with the camera zooming towards a door with a bed and satin sheets, shots of LA bars and hotels, and photos of Weinstein that emphasise his size and his grotesque appearance that feel more at home on Dateline. They’re a distraction that comes off as a directorial gimmick.
Which is odd because there’s truly no need for them. Like USA Gymnastics Scandal, the story is right there. The drama is right there. Paz de la Huerta will absolutely break your heart as she slices through the Hollywood façade in just a few words. Or any of the other women featured (most of whom are not the recurring names audiences have likely already read about), whose stories are all achingly similar and sting with the disappointment of crushed dreams.
Both films highlight – as did Leaving Neverland for another recent example – why it is important to listen to survivors and to hear them when they talk. Many were dismissed, others not believed. While I may have quibbles with the latter, both films show how the story of these survivors is the most compelling part any documentary has.
Release: At the Heart of Gold is now Available On Demand on HBO GO and HBO NOW. Untouchable is on Hulu.
Oscar chances: It would be a shock if a Weinstein movie made the shortlist, wouldn’t it? I still feel like it would. And despite my defence, something like At the Heart of Gold is likely just too traditional to make headway in a category full of titles that are bigger, glossier and more immediate.