Very Realistic Hockey Scenes Help Make This A Winner

Rating: 9/10 (3 October 2006)

This was a pretty nice movie overall. It had its bad points but they were more subtle. The good stuff was out in front: the realistic hockey scenes and the inspiring true-life story of an amazing underdog sports team pulling off the "miracle." That, of course, was the 1980 United States Olympic hockey team winning the gold medal and along the way becoming the first team in 20 years to defeat the Soviets.
The story also is about Herb Brooks, the coach of the team. Everything in here centers around him. Kurt Russell does a nice job playing him, although I don't understand the Polish accent Russell used. Why would Brooks have a Polish accent?
Over the years, sports movies - as in other genres - are becoming more and more realistic. This was about as good as it gets in that regard. A number of the actors are players, meaning they know how to skate. A documentary with the DVD shows the great lengths they went to in filming this in order make the action look realistic. It's not fake; these guys know how to play the game and the camera-work, along with the sound, is outstanding.
For a fairly long film (135 minutes) this film moves by fast and the drama is there but not super-intense since everyone knows the final result. The story is basically, as mentioned, about Brooks and the way he molded a group of kids together to play so well as a team. Many of his ideas would not have been implemented had others had a say, but Brooks proved them all wrong.
The only part of the film that was totally unnecessary was the typical Liberal slant that Hollywood just has to put in our faces every chance it gets. Here, they do it by quick cheap shots against Republican Presidents while airing an inspirational speech by Democrat Jimmy Carter. They have just stuck with the hockey angle, which the filmmakers here did extremely well. Still, it's a very good sports movie that even non- hockey fans should enjoy.