1st Year Checking

Just finished watching this documentary I rented out from Google Play Movies. This time I will be short in my review. In very short: This is a documentary for all parents and children hockey coaches to see.

Hockey is a beautiful game. I never played, can't yet skate on ice, but I love to watch. Personally I am a Toronto Mapple Leafs fan. But this documentary is about children. There is a brutal aspect of the game and we all know that. There are fights, there are hits - the so called checkings. Children are shielded from all this up to a certain age. True, initially they are forbidden to fight, but they are encouraged to check. And this is what this movie is about - the moment they are introduced to checking.

It is not a secret, that hockey and the American-style football (to differentiate from what Europeans call "football", which in North America is called "soccer") are the most dangerous sports in North America from the popular team sports. Lots of people adore them, lots of people play them either professionally, amateur leagues or just for fun in the park. But there is a dark side - lots of people do get injured and some of them do not recover or do recover for a serious amount of time and wish they never did it. And we do not want that. We all want games where everybody play for the sport, games which are safe for everybody or at least games where no serious injuries could happen. But reality is different.

What this documentary differs is that it is done trough the eyes of both a children coach and a father, because the main character is the coach's son. The movie follows him and his teammates from the moment right before checkings are introduced, to the moment where some kids have already broke their arms in their second year of checking. We see several points of view - the coaches, the concussion specialists, the mothers and fathers and most of all - the children themselves.

Generally the movie is well done. There is a nice camera work, nice music, including a very good end song. Story is well developed and generally I would recommend this movie to absolutely all parents and children hockey coaches out there. And most importantly - do show this movie to your children! Even though my son does not play hockey at all, he is close to the age of these kids and I have shown him already few moments and plan to show him few more today. I have to say even I re-winded few moments several times to watch certain important things.

What I really like about the movie is they try to show a more dynamic picture, for which they have mounted cameras on several places - on the rink walls and on the players.

So to finish all this - all parents, children and children hockey coaches should watch this.