Take one part Mighty Ducks, one part Remember the Titans and mix them in a blender. Add a healthy dash of patriotism, some heavy regional accents, sift out any remnants of Pacey Witter and you’ve got Miracle, a movie that will entertain both puckheads and hockey illiterates alike.
Though it follows the story of coach Herb Brooks (Kurt Russell) and the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team on the way to the famous “Miracle on Ice” victory over the Soviet Union, this is a sports movie just like Field of Dreams and Hoosiers were sports movies. The sport is part of the story, but it’s not the whole story.
Director Gavin O’Connor (Tumbleweeds) and screenwriter Mark Ciardi use the rink as a perfect backdrop for numerous interwoven plotlines and personal stories.
The film begins not with the stunning win over the Soviets in Lake Placid, but on a small rink in Colorado Springs during the tryouts for the Olympic team. Miracle’s most compelling scenes come not during the thrilling Olympic win, but in the grueling months leading up the Olympics, when the iron-fisted Brooks pushes his players to the breaking point. O’Connor does an excellent job of conveying the atmosphere in America during the height of the Cold War.
While each member of the 20-man roster gets at least a little face time, goalie Jim Craig (Eddie Cahill), forward Mike Eruzione (Patrick O’Brien Demsey) and defenseman Jack O’Callahan (Michael Mantenuto) receive the most attention. Ironically, all three and forward Dave Silk (Bobby Hansen) played hockey at Boston University under head coach Jack Parker before joining the Olympic team.
While Cahill believably portrays Craig’s struggle to accept the loss of his mother and O’Brien Demsey plays (and looks like) a perfect Eruzione, Mantenuto steals the show as the hard-hitting “OC.” From an early on-ice fight with an old rival to a knee injury that threatens his chance to play for the gold medal, Mantenuto stands out in a group of hockey players-turned-actors that could easily hold its own with the best line Hollywood has to offer.
That may be what separates Miracle from almost every other sports movie in its class. The hockey scenes are stunningly realistic for one simple reason: These guys are hockey players.
The best cinematography and editing in the world could not disguise a fake body check between two actors who learned to skate weeks before they began shooting. The makers of Miracle took a backward approach, holding hockey tryouts all over North America before whittling the crowd down to the final 20 (including Hansen, who played at BU from 1996 to 2000).
To match the well-practiced Minnesota accent Russell learned for his role, most of the Boston and Minnesota players were cast with New England and Midwest natives, respectively. The players had acting coaches and basic support, but the raw and unpolished exuberance is what makes the team so believable.
The hockey scenes are great, the characters are engaging and the true story is one of those Hollywood-couldn’t-write-this rarities. But it’s the team camaraderie and behind-the-scenes subplots that make the 1980 “Miracle on Ice” such a great story and make Miracle one of the best sports movies in recent years.