STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning

A series of young women across the USA held dreams of competing on the US Olympics Team, determined to go all the way, but were subjected to shattering abuse from their coaches and trainers, under the organisation USA Gymnastics, run by businessman Stephen Penny. But it was one man, Olympic Doctor Larry Nasser, who became the subject of a series of sexual abuse allegations, and following the testimonies of various young women, was sent down, only for his misconduct to reveal a wider, further reaching circle of corruption and silence across the industry.

Within the space of the last ten or so years, the veneer of respectability that covered the seemingly wholesome institutions that we all loved has come crashing down, and we live with a far less blinkered time, with greater awareness of the abuses that go on behind the scenes. It's now widely accepted that abuse and predators lurk within every high profile institution around the world, and this unsettling documentary depicts the goings on in the world of the US Olympics.

There's a depressingly familiar pattern on display here that allows the abuse to happen in settings like this, and for the abusers to get away with it for as long as it does and abuse as many people as they do. A feeling of not being believed, feelings of fear of reporting the abuser, inaction on account of the reputational damage to the body in question, loss of deals and sponsorships (money),people covering their own backs...it's understandable and very sad that people with a desire to follow their dreams will now feel very distrustful and disillusioned with how those in charge behave.

Success, but at what cost? That's the sad, disheartening message at the core of this documentary, a sad tale of lives being destroyed and dreams being shattered through no fault of those it happens to. ****

Sports= athlete+coach+medicine+ money= manipulation of humans= robotnics

might sound weird, but at the top levels it has been like that for decades. this is the second documentary ive watched on the lawrence nassar case, and i sit back horrified again how this all could happen. that this has been disclosed is just lovely and it would never have happened unless the metoo wave came forward so thanks to them too. this documentary though goes even deeper into the material than the forementioned docu did, so it give far more than just an abstract to the case.

its an extremely touching and emotional personal documentary that goes far, but couldve gone even further, i will not be surprised if other similar cases will evolve in other sports in the near future, especially sports where the athletes are very young and drained unconscious by extremely hard training in young age, and in sports that where its natural to be bareskinned/halfnaked to perform, e.g competition swimming and diving.

this is a must see production for everyone even for the potential predators out there, cause ''we''ll be watching out for you. and to the active sportlers themselves, do confine or tell your close ones if there are things happening that you dont like or understand at your workout/gym/pool/track, because ''your life matters''.

its a truthfull and heartfelt recommend.

As a Romanian almost the age of Nadia Comaneci let me tell you I witnessed her age of glory and the hype around her: she's been the hero of our generation! All Romanian girls wanted to become a gymnast at that time. But little by little it became clear for those able to read between lines that things were rotten in the world of gymnastics: Nadia has had a sheer luck to have a beautiful body she hasn' t lost; the other evoluated differently and soon it was clear the exercises did more harm than good to a child development. Sure they were spectacular and eye-catching but girls became more and more masculine and short and hard to look at. I am speaking as a doctor (which I am) and tell you a sport is supposed to teach you concentration, disciplind, to enorce your development and provide you with a healthy constitution. Instead of this, gymnastics as it is practiced today is anti-feminine nature. Girls have to take hormonal medication to control their menses, they are injuring their pelvic area in their exercises, they get an underdeveloped stature, pelvis and breasts, an overdeveloped thorax and masculine musculature. Is this the beauty of a gymnast body!? That Larry "doctor" explained the procedures he was using were designed to reposition the girls coccix - but why on earth should a young girl injure her coccix in an activity supposed to build her body, to start with?! Who imagined these exercises?! These are acrobacies not sport! This excessive control and pressure over these girls weren't necessary were the difficulty of the exercises and figures not so high and unnatural! I wish I won't have to witness what gymnastics would look like in 20 ys from now on if this race against normal body performances will continue this way. :( You want your girl to develop a beautiful body through exercises, make her do rhytmic gymnastics where you have elongations, stretching, grace, balance control and rhytm exercises! This sport is shamefully kept in shadow and deserves more attention!