Synopsis:
A former tap-dancer had to forgo his dream due to his leg injury. So he went back to Japan to woo her figure skating girlfriend. His proposal was rejected by the girl's father unless he could coach a school ice-hockey team to win a tournament. The team had zero history of winning and the coach had zero knowledge about ice-hockey. Is he able to lead the team to victory and to get approval from his father-in-law-to-be?
My opinion:
I always expected this to be a sports-genre movie. Thus I was quite surprised when I saw (at the website where I got the movie) that it is listed as family-genre. After watching, I guess the more appropriate genre will be: drama/romance. Haha..
Another wrong perception is that I expected this to be some cliche-sports movies where the coach will use his "tap-dancing" skills and somehow make the kids incorporate this to their sports and make them win.. Again, this is wrong! Lol..
Anyway, the movie has a pretty nice plot. It is kinda genius I think. The main protagonist seems to be the coach but the movie opened in year 2007 with a guy going back to his school to see a lady was ice-skating. This brought back his memories 20 years ago. He turned out to be one of the hockey players for the school. And this leads to the events described in the synopsis.
The team is actually not lousy. They are pretty good, it is just that they have no team work. With the child-psychology that the coach has, he managed to revamp the team to have more self-confidence and team work. Then poof: the team became a champion.
However, sports is not the focus. It is more of the drama.. The guy (who reminisced his past) has a crush on a pretty girl who ice-skates (at the school, the ice-hockey and the ice-skating shared an ice ring). Too bad this boy is just too passive. It is the girl who makes the first move and asks him out for a date! Lol.. Unfortunately and suddenly (normal cliche..), the girl is diagnosed with acute lymphoid leukimia and she is dying. She is giving up.. Thus the ice-hockey cheers her up. They promise to try their best to make a miracle (to win the tournament) and the girl must promise that she will try her best to survive the disease. While the guys make it, the girl does not T_T
Afterthoughts:
I love the match scenes. Haha.. They are intense and fast-paced. Wow.. Really exciting. I am surprised that ice-hockey is quite a rough sports. The players can bump each other into the wall and it is not counted as fault. Lol.. The punishment is even more cute. The players are sent to a small room for a set period of time. They can only watch the match behind a glass window and express their stress there. Lol.. The change of players is also fast and does not disrupt the match. And the best is, they can use any body parts to hit or catch the ball/the disc (whatever the thing is termed in ice hockey). Perhaps, it is good that sports is not the 'focus' of the movie. There is not magical shots being featured. How the team actually wins is due to team work instead of inhumane skills etc lol.. And nope, there is no tap-dancing skills incorporated to the gameplay. In fact, the last winning shot is more due to pure luck, instead of some supernatural shot. Thumbs up.
The change of position of the team members is also too good to be true. Lol. The coached as the goalie to be a forward because "he knows which position goalie hates". He lets the geek to be a goalie and lets a small-sized person to play so that the whole team will protect "these weaklings" and hence play a better team work in defense. I don't know whether it is true in real life sports haha..
The twist is good too. I thought the girl survived (because I thought the girl at the start of the movie is the same girl with disease). Actually they are different girl. Haha.. At the ending, the movie returned to 2007 and the girl told the guy to smile. Haha.. Then suddenly, the guy remembered the movie he watched during his date with his childhood girlfriend. The movie was titled "Smile". And he recalled the line mentioned by the girl in this movie (movie in a movie??! Lol): "I will come back to you someday. And when that time comes, you will know because I will call you with your nickname 'smile'. A nickname I give to a boy whom never smiles". In the flashback, only the first sentence was shown. The rest was 'swallowed' as the girl told the boy about the disease. I thought it was cool that the movie that they watched actually corresponds to the boy's life. Haha.. Great plot.. but I am sure I will miss it if I never rewind (or if I watch it in cinema). And the movie ends happilly with the guy and the girl laughing lol.
Anyway, the movie opened with Jackson's 5 "Little Drummer Boy". I was a bit stunned because I didn't know the movie was set during Xmas time. So I thought "Did I download the correct movie?". Haha.. The song was featured again when the team received a letter from the girl (at that time, she already passed away.. it seems that she wrote the letter much earlier because she believed the guys would win lol) when they were behind the opponent. After that, in their sadness, they started singing the song in the locker room.. Magically, it could be heard by the spectators and they all sang the song. o_0 One of the parents is an aspiring opera singer and I always find it weird to see an Asian sing opera. Lol..
Overall, I enjoy the movie ^o^ I love the good plot twist.. I like the non-cliche storylines (though of course, protagonist's never loses). Great great great.. The gags scenes are also good. One memorable scene was when a girl punched a guy who rejected him, this guy was thrown into the air, out of the ice ring, with his nose bleeding and the blood dripped grossfully in a slow-mo. Lol. Just so lame. Haha.. I am glad I picked a correct movie to watch during my emo CNY :)
My opinion:
I always expected this to be a sports-genre movie. Thus I was quite surprised when I saw (at the website where I got the movie) that it is listed as family-genre. After watching, I guess the more appropriate genre will be: drama/romance. Haha..
Another wrong perception is that I expected this to be some cliche-sports movies where the coach will use his "tap-dancing" skills and somehow make the kids incorporate this to their sports and make them win.. Again, this is wrong! Lol..
Anyway, the movie has a pretty nice plot. It is kinda genius I think. The main protagonist seems to be the coach but the movie opened in year 2007 with a guy going back to his school to see a lady was ice-skating. This brought back his memories 20 years ago. He turned out to be one of the hockey players for the school. And this leads to the events described in the synopsis.
The team is actually not lousy. They are pretty good, it is just that they have no team work. With the child-psychology that the coach has, he managed to revamp the team to have more self-confidence and team work. Then poof: the team became a champion.
However, sports is not the focus. It is more of the drama.. The guy (who reminisced his past) has a crush on a pretty girl who ice-skates (at the school, the ice-hockey and the ice-skating shared an ice ring). Too bad this boy is just too passive. It is the girl who makes the first move and asks him out for a date! Lol.. Unfortunately and suddenly (normal cliche..), the girl is diagnosed with acute lymphoid leukimia and she is dying. She is giving up.. Thus the ice-hockey cheers her up. They promise to try their best to make a miracle (to win the tournament) and the girl must promise that she will try her best to survive the disease. While the guys make it, the girl does not T_T
Afterthoughts:
I love the match scenes. Haha.. They are intense and fast-paced. Wow.. Really exciting. I am surprised that ice-hockey is quite a rough sports. The players can bump each other into the wall and it is not counted as fault. Lol.. The punishment is even more cute. The players are sent to a small room for a set period of time. They can only watch the match behind a glass window and express their stress there. Lol.. The change of players is also fast and does not disrupt the match. And the best is, they can use any body parts to hit or catch the ball/the disc (whatever the thing is termed in ice hockey). Perhaps, it is good that sports is not the 'focus' of the movie. There is not magical shots being featured. How the team actually wins is due to team work instead of inhumane skills etc lol.. And nope, there is no tap-dancing skills incorporated to the gameplay. In fact, the last winning shot is more due to pure luck, instead of some supernatural shot. Thumbs up.
The change of position of the team members is also too good to be true. Lol. The coached as the goalie to be a forward because "he knows which position goalie hates". He lets the geek to be a goalie and lets a small-sized person to play so that the whole team will protect "these weaklings" and hence play a better team work in defense. I don't know whether it is true in real life sports haha..
The twist is good too. I thought the girl survived (because I thought the girl at the start of the movie is the same girl with disease). Actually they are different girl. Haha.. At the ending, the movie returned to 2007 and the girl told the guy to smile. Haha.. Then suddenly, the guy remembered the movie he watched during his date with his childhood girlfriend. The movie was titled "Smile". And he recalled the line mentioned by the girl in this movie (movie in a movie??! Lol): "I will come back to you someday. And when that time comes, you will know because I will call you with your nickname 'smile'. A nickname I give to a boy whom never smiles". In the flashback, only the first sentence was shown. The rest was 'swallowed' as the girl told the boy about the disease. I thought it was cool that the movie that they watched actually corresponds to the boy's life. Haha.. Great plot.. but I am sure I will miss it if I never rewind (or if I watch it in cinema). And the movie ends happilly with the guy and the girl laughing lol.
Anyway, the movie opened with Jackson's 5 "Little Drummer Boy". I was a bit stunned because I didn't know the movie was set during Xmas time. So I thought "Did I download the correct movie?". Haha.. The song was featured again when the team received a letter from the girl (at that time, she already passed away.. it seems that she wrote the letter much earlier because she believed the guys would win lol) when they were behind the opponent. After that, in their sadness, they started singing the song in the locker room.. Magically, it could be heard by the spectators and they all sang the song. o_0 One of the parents is an aspiring opera singer and I always find it weird to see an Asian sing opera. Lol..
Overall, I enjoy the movie ^o^ I love the good plot twist.. I like the non-cliche storylines (though of course, protagonist's never loses). Great great great.. The gags scenes are also good. One memorable scene was when a girl punched a guy who rejected him, this guy was thrown into the air, out of the ice ring, with his nose bleeding and the blood dripped grossfully in a slow-mo. Lol. Just so lame. Haha.. I am glad I picked a correct movie to watch during my emo CNY :)
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