Trans MMA star battles prejudice in ‘Unfightable’ doc

A harrowing, heartbreaking, inspiring portrait of Alana McLaughlin

Trans MMA fighter Alana McLaughlin stars in ‘Unfightable.’ (Photo courtesy of Fuse Media)

It’s no surprise that the fall movie landscape finds an unusually large number of films – most of them documentaries – about trans people and the challenges they face in trying to achieve an identity that matches their own sense of self. 

Transgender rights or even acceptance have never been in such a precarious place within the American political landscape since queer rights were acknowledged at all in the mainstream conversation. After eight years of ramped-up efforts by anti-trans activists to essentially legislate them out of legal existence, trans people find themselves facing a divisive and uncomfortably close election that will likely have an existential impact on their future, accompanied by persistent and vocal efforts by the conservative right-wing crowd to ostracize and stigmatize them within public perception. They’re not the only target, but they are the most vulnerable one – especially within the evangelical strongholds that might swing the election one way or the other – and that means a lot of conservative crosshairs are trained directly on them.

It’s a position they’re used to, unfortunately, which is precisely why there are so many erudite and artistic voices within the trans community emerging, prepared by years of experience and education gained from dealing with persistent transphobic dogma in American culture, to illuminate the trans experience and push back against the efforts of political opportunists by letting their stories speak for themselves. Surely there is no weapon against hatred more potent than empathy – once we recognize our own reflection in those we demonize, it’s hard to keep ourselves from recognizing our shared humanity, too – and perhaps no more potent way of conveying it than through the most visceral artistic medium of all: filmmaking

Particularly timely, in the wake of an Olympics marked by controversy over the participation of Algeria’s Imane Khelif and Taiwan’s Lin Yu-ting in the women’s competition, is “Unfightable,” from producer/director Marc J. Perez. Offering up a harrowing, heartbreaking, and ultimately inspiring portrait of Alana McLaughlin – a U.S. Army Special Forces sergeant who, following gender transition, turned female MMA fighter only to face resistance and transphobic prejudice within the rarified cultural microcosm of professional sports – while also taking a deep dive into the world of  Mixed Martial Arts and the starkly divided attitudes of those who work within it, it aims to turn one person’s trans experience into a metaphor for the struggle of an entire community to be recognized and accepted on its own terms. For the most part, it succeeds.

Unlike many such biography-heavy documentaries, “Unfightable” allows its subject – the charismatic and outspoken McLaughlin, whose presence rightly dominates the film and leaves the most lingering impression – to narrate her own story, without interpretation or commentary from “talking head” experts. From the grim-but-all-too-familiar story of her upbringing in a deeply religious family (and yes, conversion “therapy” was involved) through her struggle to define her identity via a grueling military career, her eventual transition, and her emergence as only the second transfeminine competitor in the professional MMA arena and beyond, Perez treats most of the movie’s narrative thrust like an extended one-on-one interview, in which McLaughlin delivers the story as she experienced it. This one-on-one honest expression is effectively counterpointed by the rhetoric of other MMA personalities who participated in the film, some of which is shockingly transphobic despite protestations of having “nothing against” trans people.

At the same time, the film acknowledges and amplifies supportive voices within the MMA, whose efforts to bring McLaughlin into the fold were not only successful, but ultimately led to her victorious 2021 match against French fighter Celine Provost. It’s a tale that hits all the touchstone marks of queer/trans experience for those whose lives can’t really begin until they break free of their oppressive origins, and whose fight to claim an authentic life for themself is frequently waged against both the families who ostensibly love them and the prejudices of a society eager to condemn anything that deviates from the perceived “norm”. Naturally, as a story of individual determination, self-acceptance, and success against the odds, its main agenda is to draw you in and lift you up; but it does so while still driving home the point about how far the road still stretches ahead before trans athletes – and by extension, trans people in general – are afforded the same legitimacy as everyone else.

To ensure that reality is never forgotten or taken lightly, we are offered some pretty egregious examples; from prominent fighters who insist they “have no problem” with trans people as a preface for their transphobic beliefs about trans athletes, to McLaughlin’s long wait before finding another MMA pro who was willing to fight her we are confronted with a pattern of prejudice blocking her path forward. And though it documents her triumph, it reminds us that three years later, despite her accomplishments, she has yet to find another MMA pro willing to give her another bout.

If nothing else, though, “Unfightable” underscores a shift in attitudes that reflects the progress – however slow or maddeningly hard-won it may be – of trans people carving out space for themselves in a social environment still largely hostile to their success or even their participation. As McLaughlin’s journey illustrates, it takes dogged persistence and a not-insignificant level of righteous anger to even pierce the skin of the systemic transphobia that still opposes the involvement of people like her in sports; her experience also bears witness to the emboldened bigotry that has doubled-down on its opposition to trans acceptance since the 2016 election of a certain former president who is now seeking a second chance of his own – highlighting the dire consequences at stake for the trans community (and, let’s face it, the entire queer community alongside every other group deplored and marginalized by his followers) should his efforts toward a comeback prove successful.

Yet as grim an outlook as it may acknowledge, “Unfightable” doesn’t leave viewers with a belief in sure defeat; in the toughness of its subject – who is, as it proudly makes clear, a veteran of combat much more directly dangerous than anything she will ever encounter in the ring – and her refusal to simply give up and go away, it kindles in us the same kind of dogged resistance that fueled her own transcendence of a toxic personal history and allowed her to assert her identity –  triumphantly so, despite the transphobia that would have kept her forever from the prize.

That’s a spirit of determination that we all could use to help drive us to victory at the polls come November. Like Alana McLaughlin, we have neither the desire nor the ability to go back to the way our lives were before, and Perez’s documentary helps us believe we have the strength to keep it from happening.

“Unfightable” opened for a limited release in New York on Sept. 13 and begins another in Los Angeles on Sept. 20. It will air on ViX, the leading Spanish-language streaming service in the world, and in English on Fuse TV, following its theatrical run.