Red Army

Red Army (2014) documentary, directed by Gabriel Polsky, retells the story of probably the greatest dynasty in the history of sports, the Soviet Union national ice hockey team of the 1980's, and its best five-man unit featuring Viacheslav Fetisov and Alexei Kasatonov on defense, Vladimir Krutov, Igor Larionov, and Sergei Makarov (aka the KLM Line) at forwards, all in their 20s, aided by the legendary goalie, Vladislav Tretiak, in his 30s. The five dominated national and international hockey for nearly a decade.

Anatoli Tarasov, Russian hockey coaching pioneer, laid the foundation of their game and it was based on organized team movements and creativity to win the space, as well as individual puck control and its timely transfer into an empty space in the next zone of the rink, ultimately passing it over to a player in prosperous scoring position.

Soviet players, additionally subjected to military discipline included by Tarasov's successor, head coach Vladimir Tikhonov, who took over the Soviet national team in 1977, skated three times a day, eleven months of the year, "perfecting both, their individual skills and their teamwork." Knowing that "copy is never as good as the original", creative "father of Russian hockey", Tarasov, sought inspiration from other team sports, even from theatrical arts, primarily ballet, to create a unique style, "a completely new way of playing hockey, which changed the sport".

I was lucky to attend two matches of this incredible hockey team in the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, the first one early in the competition and the second one in the finals. In the opening round, against Cuba, USSR had an easy task to win, and in addition to watching the great team performance I was enjoying individual virtuosity of USSR players, who managed to combine two seemingly incompatible traits, improvisation with harmonious and fluent team play, comparable maybe only to similar traits of the best jazz orchestras.

As I have been coincidentally seated right in front of him, I was also listening to the professional comments of Ivica Osim, one of the greatest footballers to grace the soccer fields of Sarajevo, who has had that far spent most of his active career whether playing for or coaching my favourite local team "Zeljeznicar", and was on his way to coach the national team of Yugoslavia soon. It was pure delight to listen to professional comments this great football enthusiast and expert had about the style and strategy of the Soviet national hockey team, and about the skills of its players, as well as comparison between the two sports, level of individual skills and tactics applicable in both. I can clearly remember Osim's comments and his longing for soccer outfield players of comparable individual skills, applicable in so called total football, based extensively on players' capability to cover not only for their nominal positions in the field, but rather, should it become required, to take over the role of any other player in the team.

Strength of this team, composed of players with incomparable skills was shown in the final game. Although the end result was not impressive, 2:0, nearly routine execution left no doubt who's dominant, and another participant, Czechoslovakia, practically had never had a chance to win.

Documentary, cleverly composed from interviews with three players of thus far surely the best five skater hockey unit ever to hit the ice, and from mixture of archive footage from their games, trainings and other life events, by showing how great and undefeatable they have been, really does them a great justice. Therefore, in the rest of this review I'll rather just add the words of the "Red Army" director, copied from a featurette "Gabe Polsky Hockey Commentary" found on a DVD:

(Red Army-Director Gabe Polsky discusses the essence of Soviet hockey-2014)

"I'm Gabe Polsky and I directed the movie Red Army. The Film is about the Soviet Union and the greatest sports dynasty in history. The Soviet Union national hockey team revolutionized sport, they took hockey and sport to a whole new creative level. When I was a young kid and I watched for the first time (the) Soviet Union play in a 1987 Canada Cup VHS tape it was a religious experience, it was incredible what they did on the ice creatively. This was the best hockey ever played in history. In the series you saw the greatest players from the Soviet Union face off against the greatest Canadian players. (Starting Line-ups: USSR (Fetisov, Makarov, Larionov, Krutov, Kasatonov) vs Canada (Grossman, Gartner, Gretzky, Messier, Bourque).) The Soviet style play here is like a finely tuned symphony: the passing, weaving, improvisation. (Situation description) Krutov hits the puck out of the air to his team mate Makarov who has a breakaway: improvisation and awareness. (Situation description) Here we see how they knew each other so well they could almost play blindfolded together. The passing is like an artistic tapestry. They transitioned fast and confused defenders with their movement. (Situation description) Here we see incredible skill and creativity, and a sense of one another. This kind of hockey was incredibly fun to watch. (Situation description) Here we see how quickly they punish you for mistakes. (Situation description) This is one of my favourite players showing the skill level of the Soviet players... (Situation description) The Soviet game and style is all about puck possession and passing we see here. (Situation description) Here's Sergei Makarov, one of the greatest magicians in hockey history, passes to Krutov and then has an accurate shot. (Situation description) Here tremendous skill, being able to shoot from any position. (Situation description) And this here (Demiensky breakthrough and score), my friend, is pure art... the essence of hockey."

Learning the essence and enjoying the art of ice hockey, indeed, while delightfully watching masters of the ice rink in their stellar moments.

Director Gabe Polsky uses his debut documentary Red Army to explore perhaps one of the most intriguing stories of hockey that has ostensibly swept under the rug in the modern day. Polsky tells the story of the Soviet Union's hockey team during the Cold War. He uses the captain of the Soviet's hockey team known as HC CSKA Moscow Viacheslav "Slava" Fetisov to paint the picture of an unstoppable hockey team that practiced ruthlessly and was kept under less than adequate conditions by their dictator of a coach.

Right of the bat, Fetisov is a cantankerous presence, thoroughly unpleasant to the audience and Polsky, going as far as to flip off Polsky whilst he plays on his phone in the middle of an interview. However, Fetisov finally gets the intriguing story out of him that we came for. He tells of a time when the Soviet Union selected hockey as the country's sport and how numerous young children would stand in line for hours on end to try out for the Soviet teams. The USSR was about unity and people saw hockey as a way to unite everyone through the spirit of a team and the desire to win at all costs.

The HC CSKA Moscow, better known by their name of the "Red Army," was a meticulously coached and organized team. Archival footage showing practices and actual games show a team hellbent on executing strategy, with slick, blink-and-you-miss-it puck passing amongst players, even in the tightest situations. One of Polsky's angles in the film is how there is a contrast between American hockey and Soviet hockey and that contrast is evident just by looking at a few clips of the Red Army in action. Where the Red Army was concerned with maintaining puck possession in the toughest situations, American hockey finds itself often preoccupied with checking and fighting.

The Red Army was coached by Viktor Tikhonov, the aforementioned ruthless coach. No player featured in Red Army has a particularly kind word to spare for Tikhonov, all of whom reflecting on some of his most frighteningly strict and demeaning moments. One player recalls how he wouldn't let a teammate visit his dying father back home, and another reflects on how players urinated blood because Tikhonov worked them so hard. Tikhonov believed in a dictatorship when it came to coaching hockey; he was also worried about players defecting or abandoning allegiance to the USSR in favor of playing for the NHL. If Tikhonov thought one of his players was planning to jump ship, no matter how skilled they were, he would cut them and blacklist them from hockey, all but guaranteeing they'd never get an opportunity to play in the NHL.

Those who did get the fortunate opportunity to play in the NHL, thanks to their unbelievable talent and skill, like Fetisov, a nineteen-year-old rookie named Alexandr Mogilny, and the talented center Sergei Fedorov, found themselves under an unrealistic amount of scrutiny for their decision. Fetisov, in particular, had to jump through a series of hoops in order to land the spot on the roster of the New Jersey Devils. Devils' manager Lou Lamoriello had granted an immense signing bonus to Fetisov but the Soviet Union refused to give up one of their most dynamic players. The Soviets saw players jumping ship for the NHL as a victory for the west and a grand loss for the USSR.

Red Army does a fine job at exposing the blurred line of sports and politics, showing how during the Cold War era, the two worked in conjunction with one another quite brazenly. Polsky works to keep this documentary on topic, although in only eighty-four minutes, and admittedly a great deal of ground to cover and characters to profile, it's difficult for Polsky to hit all his targets with complete development. It almost feels like this runtime was set before the documentary even began filming and he was prohibited from going over by even a minute. Still, this is a hearty documentary that houses a great deal of personality in its depictions of contrasting views and politics of the same sport and how politics itself got involved in a sport and resulted in a messy ordeal for many involved.

Directed by: Gabe Polsky.

There has never been such beauty in sport than ice hockey performed by the Soviet Union at its best. How was it possible? It's pretty obvious that it all was due to propaganda reasons. The Communist human was superior, according to Soviet leaders. Or at least they wanted to think so; but the almost only way to prove it was through the athletes.

The legendary Fetisov tells most of the story here. How the players were kept almost as slaves under the regime of KGB man Tichonov. And when finally the Soviet system broke down, Fetisov and his comrades were allowed to play in NHL. But had to give most of their money to the embassy.

A sometimes breathtaking documentary and the system succeeded in creating some of the best athletes ever. And yes, they impressed the West. But the price was high.

You'll note that the only bad reviews so far are Canadian hockey fans upset that those too young to remember Russian Hockey dominance, will learn that Canada was never the defacto all Hockey rulers of the world as they like to claim. Fact is, Russia was the best in the world for quite some time. This is just a tough pill for Canadian hockey fans to swallow.

My only complaint is the interviewer did come off as amateurish and disrespectful. Outside of that, I thought the film was very introspective with lots of old footage of the former USSR. Excellent interviews. And to the guy complaining about no Tikhonov interview, it clearly stated at the end of the film that Tikhonov declined an interview request.

This is an excellent documentary. If you can put your patriotic homerism aside and respect it for what it is, you will enjoy it.

I came away from this movie deep in thought, trying to piece together the personal journeys of the cast, the context of life in the USSR, the changes and resulting impact upon the players lives.

This documentary is well researched and highly viewable, it is not just a male only film.

Women get to see stripped to the bare bone, deep male team bonding, open responses to complex relationships and real meaning as to how 5 men dominated a sport in the USSR and the Americas.

The death of one of the cast members shortly after the movie added a melancholy touches, yet there is humour from both Gabe Polsky and Vyacheslav Fetisov.

It was clever, I see this documentary staying around for some time, certainly one to watch again.