Red Army (opens in Cleveland March 13th exclusively at the Cedar Lee Theatre)

[RED ARMY opens in Cleveland on Friday March 13th exclusively at the Cedar Lee Theatre.]

Review by Pamela Zoslov

“The game for them wasn't just a game, it was also propaganda,” says writer Vladimir Pozner about the Soviet Union's most popular sport, hockey, in Gabe Polsky's documentary RED ARMY. The film tells the remarkable story of the Soviet Red Army hockey team from the 1950s through the '90s, and the intersection of hockey with Cold War politics. “Sports were a kind of warfare,” Pozner says. As this film demonstrates, that is an understatement.

The fascinating story of the team and its members is told largely through its many-medaled captain, Viacheslav (“Slava”) Fetisov. Slava talks about growing up in the Soviet Union in the early '60s with “no water, no toilets,” but a love for playing hockey, using empty cans for pucks. His parents found 250 rubles to buy him equipment on the black market, and soon young Slava was accepted to train at the prestigious Red Army School. The young recruits — “the best of the best” — trained intensively, and were indoctrinated in the superiority of the Soviet system. “Real men play hockey, cowards don't play hockey,” the student athletes are shown chanting, with typical Russian dourness.