This past weekend should have been one of the best of the sports year as the Toronto Blue Jays were to start the regular major league baseball season.
It wasn’t that I expected the Jays to have a great season, they were at best third, with tonnes of things needing to fall into place, and more reasonably fourth in the American League east, but their season start is a signal winter is nearly over, and green grass is on the horizon.
But, alas the Jays and season are still likely weeks away, so back to hockey.
Of course there’s no National Hockey League action either. But, there are some hockey movies on the tube that can fill in for the real thing.
To start with check out ‘Goalie’ which is currently on the tube.
Goalie is a 2019 Canadian biographical sports film about the hockey goaltender Terry Sawchuk. The film was directed and co-written by Adriana Maggs. Sawchuk is played by Mark O’Brien.
The movie shows a side of hockey from an era when even superstars were treated like so much chattel.
For a doubleheader night check out Mr Hockey: The Gordie Howe Story, starring Michael Shanks as Gordie and Kathleen Robertson as his wife Colleen. The story focuses on Howe moving to the World Hockey Association to play with sons Mark and Marty, and is an excellent film.
Sticking with the idea of bio pics there is The Rocket that should be sought out.
The Rocket is the story of Montreal great Maurice Richard, which stars Roy Dupuis.
If you want to dig a bit deeper, look for the 1980 release The Hounds of Notre Dame. The movie focuses on Father Athol Murray played by Thomas Peacocke an opinionated, chain-smoking, hard drinking parish priest at Notre Dame College in Wilcox, Saskatchewan. Set in the 1940s this is a story with a definite local interest given Notre Dame remains a hockey factory in the province.
A more contemporary hockey film that is must-watch is the 2017 release Indian Horse.
From Wikipedia the film is “an adaptation of Ojibwe author Richard Wagamese’s novel Indian Horse, the film centres on Saul Indian Horse, a young Canadian First Nations boy who survives the Indian residential school system to become a star ice hockey player. The film and the book highlight the story behind Canada’s indigenous residential schools. The film stars Sladen Peltier as Saul at age 6, Forrest Goodluck as Saul at age 15, and Ajuawak Kapashesit as Saul at age 22, as well as Edna Manitowabi, Evan Adams, Michiel Huisman, Michael Murphy and Martin Donovan.”
You can also pop over to the National Film Board website to check out a new short film.
“A new short documentary by Sri Lankan-Canadian filmmaker Sandi Rankaduwa, Ice Breakers explores the buried history of how black athletes helped pioneer modern hockey, as seen through the present-day journey of Nova Scotian Josh Crooks, a young, gifted African-Canadian hockey player in an overwhelmingly white sport.
That should keep hockey fans satisfied for a few nights. Next week maybe I’ll look at some of the best of baseball movies.
