Rink dreams

>> Mystery, Alaska wants you to feel good about hockey

by JASON BOGDANERIS

The few hockey films that trickle out of Hollywood inevitably portray the game as a savage bloodsport played by toothless Neanderthals. And to its credit, Mystery, Alaska doesn't dumb down the sport. Here, hockey is treated with a fetish-like reverence; bone-crushing hip-checks are savoured in slow-motion, Sam Peckinpah style. Co-written and -produced by David E. Kelley (Ally McBeal, The Practice), it also has many of his trademark gimmicky touches: quirky slapstick, courtroom histrionics and small-town sentimentality.

Basically a David-and-Goliath tale, the story pits a shinny-playing group of amateurs from the small town of Mystery against fatcat professionals from the big city. Hockey is such an important part of this "witch-tit cold" town that everyone in it is defined in relation to the weekly game, a four-on-four contest whose participants are chosen by three town elders. The local players even watch hockey during sex, seemingly more turned on by a well-aimed wrist shot than a roll in the hay.

Mystery exists in an idyllic Frank Capra time warp. When its obsession is exposed in a Sports Illustrated article, local-boy-turned-big-city-producer Charles Danner (Hank Azaria) arranges a media-friendly game with the New York Rangers. This is followed by the customary "are you crazy--well, maybe we could--hell ya, let's do it" cycle of reactions.

The town pulls together to save its reputation and its raison d'être. That includes John Biebe (Russell Crowe), veteran player and town sheriff, who undergoes a mid-life crisis when he's dropped from the lineup in favour of the "new kid," who can "skate like the wind" and is as pure as the mountain air.

There are a couple of unexpected treats. Little Richard appears in a fish-out-of-water cameo, and Burt Reynolds juggles the roles of judge and hockey coach. But best of all is Mike Myers as Donnie Shultzhoffer, a Don Cherry-like analyst with a vintage mullet.

While the acting is credible, Mystery's script and direction often lapse into TV-movie-of-the-week sentimentality. Amazingly, the story manages to ransack nearly every artifact from the pantheon of sports films clichés. Small-screen wunderkind David E. Kelley has created what, for some, will be a welcome nostalgic trip to frost-bitten afternoons of open-air hockey. To his detractors, this Rocky on skates offers ample evidence that he's overrated.

Mystery, Alaska opens Friday, October 1