SLAP SHOT (FILM)

'''Slap Shot''' is a 1977 film starring Paul Newman and Michael Ontkean and directed by George Roy Hill. The film is based on a book written by Nancy Dowd, based in part on her brother Ned Dowd's experiences playing minor league hockey in the United States in the seventies, during which time violence, especially in the low minors, was the selling point of the game.
At the time, Dowd was living in LA, when she got a call from her brother Ned, a member of the Jets. Her brother gave her the bad news that the team was for sale. Dowd asked her brother who owned the club, and he told her that he had no idea. ^[1] Dowd would move to the area and be inspired to write ''Slap Shot''. It was filmed in Pittsburgh, Johnstown, Pennsylvania and upstate New York.

Contents

Plot

Cast

Critics

Miscellaneous

Tributes

References

External links

Plot

The movie focuses on a fictitious "Federal League" team called the 'Charlestown Chiefs'. The team, a perennial loser and in financial trouble due to mill closings in the town, is due to be folded at season's end.
Through the course of regular business, the team picks up the Hanson Brothers, violent goons with child-like mentalities. Reggie Dunlop, the veteran player-coach (played by Newman), perceiving them to be eccentric and unreliable, initially chooses not to play them. Finally, in a moment of desperation and passiveness, he brings the trio of thugs into the game to see what they can do. Their big open-ice hits and overly aggressive - bordering on homicidal - style of play is greatly praised by the fans in desperate need of something for which to cheer.
Dunlop, seeing the potential in this style of play, retools the team in the Hansons' image. Most of the other players - including Dave "Killer" Carlson (Jerry Houser) - take a liking to this, with the exception of Ned Braden (Ontkean), used to a clean, flashy style of play from his college days. Meanwhile, Braden's wife (Lindsay Crouse) has difficulty adjusting to the life of a hockey wife and finds a sympathizer in Dunlop's long-estranged wife.
It is also revealed to the team that as a result of the mill closing, this will be the last season for the Chiefs. As a means of keeping his team motivated, Dunlop plants a story (which is an outright lie) that the Chiefs are being sold to a prospective buyer in Florida and thus moving the team out of Charlestown. Finally, Dunlop asks the team's stingy General Manager (played by Strother Martin) who the Chiefs' owner is. After meeting the owner (a middle-aged woman living in a comfy suburb), she reveals that the team could be sold, but won't be, as she would prefer to fold the franchise and take a tax writeoff.
The whole idea turns around in the final game when the players discover there will not be another season and most are about to play their last game. Initially, they all vow to play a clean game, but their vicious style of play has provoked the opposing team - the Syracuse Bulldogs - to put together the most infamous set of goons ever to disgrace a hockey rink. When their annoyed business manager tells the losing Chiefs that there are NHL scouts in the stands, the game quickly degenerates into an on-ice slugfest. Suddenly, Ned Braden spies his estranged wife in the crowd, wearing fashionable clothes and a hairdo. He skates out to center ice and strips off his uniform - even the band gets into the act by playing "The Stripper". Suddenly, the teams stop fighting and start laughing - all except Syracuse captain Tim "Dr Hook" McCracken, who demands the referee stop Braden. When the official refuses, McCracken sucker-punches the ref, causing the referee to forfeit the game, and the Federal League championship, to the Chiefs. The team celebrates by parading around the ice with the championship trophy, carried by a jockstrap-only-clad Braden. It's revealed during the championship parade that Dunlop has landed a job as coach of a new team, the Minnesota Nighthawks -- and he intends to bring his players with him.
Ned Dowd himself played Syracuse goon Ogie Oglethorpe in the film and later used the role to launch a career as a Hollywood character actor and producer.
The three actors who play the Hanson brothers: Steve Carlson, Jeff Carlson and Dave Hanson, were actually real hockey players, and the Carlsons are actually brothers. A third Carlson brother, Jack Carlson was supposed to appear as the third brother, with Dave Hanson playing the character of the player Dave "Killer" Carlson, which was based on him. Jack was called up to play for the Edmonton Oilers in the WHA play-offs so he was not available for the film, so Dave Hanson took his place.

Cast

★ Paul Newman - Reggie Dunlop

★ Strother Martin - Joe McGrath

★ Michael Ontkean - Ned Braden

★ Jennifer Warren - Francine Dunlop

★ Lindsay Crouse - Lily Braden

★ Jerry Houser - Dave 'Killer' Carlson

★ Andrew Duncan - Jim Carr

★ Jeff Carlson - Jeff Hanson

★ Steve Carlson - Steve Hanson

★ David Hanson - Jack Hanson

★ Yvon Barrette - Denis Lemieux

★ Allan Nicholls - Johnny Upton

★ Brad Sullivan - Morris Wanchuk

★ Stephen Mendillo - Jim Ahern

★ Yvan Ponton - Jean Guy Drouin

★ Matthew Cowles - Charlie

★ Kathryn Walker - Anita McCambridge

★ Melinda Dillon - Suzanne Hanrahan

★ M. Emmet Walsh - Dickie Dunn

★ Swoosie Kurtz - Shirley Upton

★ Paul D'Amato - Tim "Dr. Hook" McCracken

★ Ronald L. Docken - Lebrun

★ Guido Tenesi - Billy Charlebois

★ Jean Rosario Tetreault - Bergeron

★ Christopher Murney - Hanrahan

★ Myron Odegaard - Final Game Referee

★ Blake Ball - Gilmore Tuttle

★ Ned Dowd - Ogie Ogilthorpe

★ Gracie Head - Pam

★ Nancy N. Dowd - Andrea

★ Barbara L. Shorts - Bluebird

★ Larry Block - Peterboro Referee

★ Paul Dooley - Hyannisport Announcer

★ Mark Bousquet - Andre "Poodle" Lussier

★ Connie Madigan - Ross "Mad Dog" Madison

★ Joe Nolan - Clarence "Screaming Buffalo" Swamptown

★ Cliff Thompson - Walt Comisky (bus driver)

Critics

★ Film critic Gene Siskel noted that his greatest regret as a critic was giving a mediocre review to this movie when it was first released. After viewing it several more times, he grew to like it more and later listed it as one of the greatest American comedy movies of all time.

★ The Wall Street Journal’s Joy Gould Boynum seemed at once entertained and repulsed by a movie so “foul-mouthed and unabashedly vulgar” on one hand and so “vigorous and funny” on the other. ^[1]

★ Ontkean’s strip tease displeased Time Magazine’s critic, Richard Shcickel, who regretted that, “in the denouement [Ontkean] is forced to go for a broader, cheaper kind of comic response.” ^[1]

Miscellaneous

The movie has had an enduring impact on hockey culture. Key lines of script are frequently quoted, some of its terms entering the hockey lexicon outright.^[4] Its enduring popularity can be seen in the fact that replica Chiefs jerseys from the movie remain popular sellers, and that the "Hanson Brothers" (hockey players Steve Carlson, Jeff Carlson and Dave Hanson) have made permanent careers out of touring as their personas from the movie.
Todd McFarlane has released a set of figures of the Hanson brothers with connecting bases resembling the hockey rink.
Paul Newman, claiming that he swore very little in real life before the making of ''Slap Shot'', said to Time Magazine in 1984, "There's a hangover from characters sometimes. There are things that stick. Since ''Slap Shot'', my language is right out of the locker room."
The movie was filmed in (and loosely based around) Johnstown, Pennsylvania and utilized several players from the then-active North American Hockey League Johnstown Jets (the team for which Dowd himself played) as extras. The Carlson Brothers and Dave Hanson also played for the Jets in real life. Many scenes were filmed in the Cambria County War Memorial Arena^[5] and Clinton Arena, the Clinton Comets' home ice, the Utica Memorial Auditorium (used as "Peterboro" where the pre-game fight occurs and where the Hanson's reprimand the referee for talking during the anthem), and in other Johnstown locales. Coincidentally, the Johnstown Jets, and the NAHL, folded in 1977, the year ''Slap Shot'' was released.
Although much of the movie takes place during the Fall and Winter seasons, filming at the Utica War Memorial took place during the month of July.

Tributes

Ned Braden (described by the team's announcer as "a college graduate...and an American citizen!", two unusual traits of a minor-league hockey player in the 70s) is at least partially based on actor Michael Ontkean, a star player for the University of New Hampshire squad in the late 60s.^[6]
Reggie Dunlop is based in part on former Long Island Ducks player/coach John Brophy, who gets homaged by his last name being used for the drunk center of the Hyannisport Presidents. Ironically, Brophy would coach one of the Hanson brothers (Jack, real name Dave Hanson) in 1978, when he played for the Birmingham Bulls. ^[7] Syracuse goon Ogie Oglethorpe was based on longtime minor-league goon Bill "Goldie" Goldthorpe
A scene in the film where the Hansons jump the Peterboro Patriots in warm-ups is based on events in a mid-1970’s playoff series between the Johnstown Jets and the Buffalo Norsemen. ^[8] The Jets had a black player and in one game, a Norsemen fan held a sign that said blacks should be playing basketball. During the next game, a pregame brawl emerged in which the Norsemen refused to come out to start the game and forefeited. ^[8]
Another scene from the movie is based on a real life event. In the film, Jeff scores and is hit in the face by a set of keys. The Hansons go into the stands and Jeff punches out the wrong fan. After the game, the Hansons are arrested. In real life, a similar incident occurred in Utica, New York against the Mohawk Valley Comets. ^[8] Jeff took a cup of ice to the face and he went into the stands with his brothers Jack and Steve. All three were arrested and it was Dave Hanson who would gather the money for bail. ^[8]
In another tribute to the movie's popularity, two real-life teams are called the Chiefs and, at one time or another, wore the fictional squad's sweaters. The ECHL's Johnstown Chiefs are also based in Johnstown and whose name came after the Charlestown team after the original owners of the Jets would not allow the new team to resurrect the Jets' name in 1988. The other is the Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu Chiefs of the Ligue nord-américaine de hockey (LNAH).
A much-derided direct-to-video sequel, '', was filmed in 2002.
The appearance and mannerisms of the Hanson Brothers inspired a professional wrestling stable known as the Dudley Boyz. Similarly, the movie inspired The Hanson Brothers, a side project of the Canadian rock band NoMeansNo.
The Maxine Nightingale tune "Right Back Where We Started From" is featured in the original release. Recently, it has been replaced in TV viewings with a generic soundalike tune (possibly due to rights issues). However, the DVD release keeps the original. The VHS version released in the early 1980s contains none of the music by the name acts as heard in the theaters; all that music is substituted with songs in the same general style of the originals, but not the actual original songs nor artists.
In the 25th anniversary edition of the Slap Shot DVD, Jeff recalls a Jets’ game in which he fights a goon named Gilles (Bad News) Bilodeau. He would seize the rinkside announcer’s microphone and hit Bilodeau on the head with it. ^[8]
The EA Sports video games "NHL 98, NHL 99, NHL 2000, NHL 2001, NHL 2002 and NHL 2003" features a mode in which you can create two custom teams, one of which, called the EA Blades, have very similar jerseys to the Chiefs.
Three Syracuse Crunch season ticket holders dress as the Hanson Brothers for each and every Crunch home game. And sometimes during a stoppage of play, if there is a man in the opposing penalty box, one of the three will get out of their seat when the theme to Bonanza begins and proceed to travel around the main row on the ice level and crash into the penalty box seemingly as a taunt to the other team.
The Chief's bus driver Walt Comisky (Cliff Thompson) takes a sledge hammer to the bus to make it look mean. He also wears a Nazi helmet with swastika, most visible when loading frenzied fans onto the bus.
Although uncredited, the opening scene where Sportscaster Jim Carr is interviewing Denis, the "Indian Spring Water" commercial that they are paused for (which prompts Denis to get up to urinate) is narrated by longtime character actor Richard Stahl, better known for his recurring role on the 70's series "It's a Living" with Ann Jillian.

References

1. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 106
2. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 106
3. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 106
4. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076723/quotes
5. http://www.warmemorialarena.com/photogallery/2005/1005/IMG_9241JPG.htm
6. http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/pdisplay.php3?pid=52740
7. Bill Boyd, all roads lead to hockey, 2004, Key Porter Books, 1-55263-618-6
8. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 107
9. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 107
10. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 107
11. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 107
12. Sports Illustrated, July 2, 2007, p. 107

External links

★ Slap Shot Hockey Page on Slap Shot Info and Merchandise

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★ The Official Home of the Hanson Bros.

★ The Charlestown Chiefs compared with the Johnstown Jets at ESPN

★ Capturing the spirit of "Slap Shot" ...30 years later

★ A new interview with Nancy Dowd

★ Interviews with cast members about the 25th anniversary

★ Part 1

★ Part 2

★ Snapshots from Slap Shot by Mike Mastovich, The Tribune-Democrat

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★ How Slapshot Inspired a Cultural Revolution. A very extensive and detailed interview with Italian writers Wu Ming 1 and Wu Ming 2 (formerly members of the cultural guerrilla movement Luther Blissett Project), conducted by professor Henry Jenkins and published on his blog in two installments, 1 and 2.