The DePaulia

Issue date: 4/17/09 Section: Entertainment

Media Credit: Universal Pictures The Hanson brothers in "Slap Shot."

Media Credit: Universal Pictures Paul Newman as the player/coach of the Chiefs.

Media Credit: Universal Pictures The Chiefs strategy for winning games.

The Chicago Blackhawks are in the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the first time in seven years. What better way to celebrate - during an off night for the 'Hawks, of course - than to watch the classic sports-comedy film "Slap Shot". Released in 1977, the movie chronicles the Charlestown Chiefs - a hapless, minor-league hockey team - and their scheming coach who tries to save them.

The late, great Paul Newman plays Reggie Dunlop, a past-his-prime hockey player on the Chiefs who also serves as their coach. Right now, it's not going too well for the team; they are in last place and routinely get trounced by their opponents while their own fans heckle and boo them - even when they do score goals. It seemingly can't get any worse.

But it does. It is announced that the local mill is closing, putting 10,000 people out of work. Since unemployed fans can't afford tickets to hockey games, Dunlop soon discovers that the Chiefs will fold at the end of the season, further plummeting team morale.

Dunlop won't give up that easily, though. He lies to a local sports reporter, claiming that an ownership group from Florida is in negotiations to purchase the team. The fabricated story gets published and seen by the Chiefs' players. This motivates them to play better, as they now believe they may have jobs next season.

The Chiefs then acquire three new players: the Hanson brothers. The three siblings look more like freakish punk rockers - with their long hair and horn-rimmed glasses - than hockey players, and they exhibit childlike behavior. Dunlop first meets the Hansons as they are beating up a Coke machine that failed to dispense a soda. He later finds a suitcase full of toy race cars in their luggage, causing him to proclaim in disbelief "they brought their f***ing TOYS with 'em!" - one of the film's many memorable lines. Thinking that the guys are morons, Dunlop does not play them. But when an injury occurs, the Hansons get their shot.

And this is where the magic happens. The Hansons can indeed play hockey - but it is the most ridiculous, over-the-top, violent style of hockey imaginable. In their first game, they smash anything that moves into the boards, knock down a referee, trip the opposing goalie, take out the arena's organist with a misfired slap shot, start a brawl and get ejected from the game. Their on-ice thuggery energizes the team and excites the fans.

Dunlop adopts this "beating the crap out of your opponents" approach as the Chiefs' new strategy, the team goes on a roll and the fans are won back. But the biggest problem still remains - the Chiefs aren't really being bought and relocated next year. With the season ending soon, Dunlop must figure out what he must do to change that.

"Slap Shot" does not attempt to legitimize fighting or violence in hockey. It does a fantastic job of making those oft-scorned aspects of the sport funny, though. So much of this stuff that would make you wince in real life is hilarious due to the irony or absurdity of it all.

However, the film does not solely rely on that aspect. A lot of the dialog is great - from the team's goalie explaining the various penalties in hockey, to one of the Hanson brothers more or less showing his affinity for the National Anthem.

Violent in some parts and vulgar in others, "Slap Shot" is nonetheless a very funny film that practically put the sports-comedy genre on the map.

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