'Miracle' at the movies
"Miracle" (2004) -- Kurt Russell was Herb Brooks, coach of the U.S. Olympic ice-hockey team who upset the powerful Soviet squad at the 1980 Lake Placid games. In this scene, Brooks is told that his group of college players don't stand a chance at the 1980 Olympic Games against the juggernaut from the Soviet Union. Credit: Buena Vista Pictures
Miracle
on screenThe United States' 1980 Olympic upset of the USSR has been great fodder for filmmakers, both in scripted and documentary form. For example:
'Miracle on Ice' (1981)The made-for-television movie appeared only a year after the events it depicted, costing it some historical perspective, perhaps, but making it easier for real game footage to be seamlessly included. Interesting casting decisions included Karl Malden as Herb Brooks and Steve Guttenberg as Jim Craig.
'Do You Believe in
Miracles? The Story of the 1980 U.S.
Hockey Team' (2001)
The U.S. victory got the full HBO documentary treatment, complete with Liev Schreiber narration and interviews with many of the principals.
'Miracle' (2004)
The standard by which all movies on the subject are judged, because for all of its Disney-esque hokeyness, it captured the spirit of the time, featured excellent hockey sequences, included a fine turn as Herb Brooks by Kurt Russell and pretty much is how anyone too young to remember 1980 forever will remember 1980.
Unlike the 1981 film about the game, Al Michaels recreated his commentary, all but his most famous line, for which the original was used.
'Of Miracles and Men' (2015)
The ESPN documentary aims to tell the tale of the 1980 game in particular and Soviet hockey more generally through the eyes of the men cast as the robotic villains in the eyes of most Americans. It succeeds, thanks to the passage of time that has allowed the likes of Slava Fetisov, Vladislav Tretiak and Boris Mikhailov to speak freely about those times and that game.
Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.
