The Cutting Edge (1992)

  This shitty movie has three sequels.  How is that even possible?

After a serious injury at the 1988 Olympics, hockey player Doug (D. B. Sweeney) is permanently benched from the sport.  His only chance to get back on the ice and get another shot at a gold medal lies with spoiled brat Kate (Moira Kelly), a champion figure skater who can't keep a partner.  The two are oil and water but must find a way to work together if they want to win.

I'm sure this was based in part on The Taming of the Shrew but it is a godawful adaptation.  Kate is a total bitch who does not grow more sympathetic as the movie progresses.  She starts off an ill-tempered, spoiled rich brat and ends up the exact same way.  The supposed "big moment" for her character is when she realizes that she actually hates skating, which you as the viewer will realize about a third of the way through the opening credits when she's haranguing her partner just before they take to the ice.  At the Olympics.

Now, you don't get to be Olympic-worthy by hating the sport you practice 18 hours a day unless you're so full of self-loathing that it creates a black hole inside you that eats every other emotion.  Most people implode long before they reach that stage.  It just takes too much effort.  But this movie wants you to believe that this girl has been on skates since she could walk, sacrificed years in study and coaching, doing nothing but train in this one event and hate it so much she's willing to sabotage herself because her daddy wants her to get a gold medal.

I think by now you all know how I feel about daddy issues being a narrative crutch.  (Cliff's Notes:  Can't relate to it, don't like it, it's boring.)  For that alone, this movie is a fail.  Then it adds on no less than three training montages, the supposedly humorous misunderstanding when Doug tells his brother he's training to be a figure skater in a sports bar full of people, and the completely unnecessary yuppie boyfriend.