Just as I’m trying to think of a reason to not actively avoid the troubled, anti-gay Sochi Olympics, along comes “The Gabby Douglas Story.” While it’s no masterpiece, this Lifetime original movie has revived my excitement for watching gymnastics. Unfortunately, that’s a summer event.
Oh well.
At any rate, Douglas’ path to the gold in 2012 is a story worth hearing, even if told in Lifetime’s nuance-free voice. Growing up poor in Virginia Beach, Douglas (first played by Sydney Mikayla, then Imani Hakim) finds her passion in a gymnastics class that her mom (Regina King) and two sisters and brother scrimp to pay for. They’re saving money, really, on all the furniture she won’t be breaking anymore by doing double handsprings through the house.
As you’d expect from this network, all the principal players have been burnished into one-dimensional characters: Gabby is driven but also fiercely devoted to her family, while her mom is noble and long-suffering and her siblings exist mostly to applaud their sister’s achievements. S. Epatha Merkerson, patron saint of TV movies, shows up as Gabby’s grandma, full of life-affirming bromides.
But complexity is not what we’re here for. Triumph over adversity is. As the first African-American to win Individual All-Around Champion — and the first gymnast to win the gold for both team and all-around — Douglas became a high-profile star in a sport in which she initially felt way out of place. “Nobody said Iowa doesn’t have any black people,” she says uncertainly to her mother when they first arrive at her Olympic training facility.
Earlier scenes show her being marginally bullied by white — and burlier — teammates at her Virginia Beach gym. And during her Iowa stay, she’s hosted by a vaguely creepy couple who give all their blonde daughters — and Gabby — matching neck-high flannel nightgowns to wear on Christmas. The trials this poor girl has suffered in pursuit of the gold!
I would have liked to have seen more of the relationship between Douglas and the Chinese coach, Liang Chow (Brian Tee), she sought out and for whom she moved to the Midwest. One of the movie’s most heartfelt moments is Chow’s description, to Gabby’s mother, of being taken from his family at the age of 5 to start training as a gymnast, only being allowed to see his relatives a few times a year after that.
In other scenes, though, Chow is boiled down into a sort of a wise Mr. Miyagi (“The Karate Kid”) figure, especially when he imparts the “secret of gymnastics” to Gabby: “It’s all one reality; it’s all part of the same perfect moment.” There is no balance beam, man! Maybe Chow really did say this, but it feels pretty silly here.
Promos for the movie mention an appearance by Douglas herself, which is a bit misleading: She doesn’t have a role; the film simply concludes with some highlights of the gymnast doing her award-winning routines at the Olympics. It’s enough to remind you that there’s nothing like watching a real champion in their element.
It might be enough to entice this reviewer to take a peek at Sochi after all.