I love underdog sports movies, and I know I’m not the only one, because they keep cycling around, but Cody Lightning has taken the trope in his new feature and done something wonderful with it. The team we are introduced to, Treaty 6 Blades, is an indigenous team playing in the country league in Northern Alberta. They’re coming off of reservations, and striving for a better life on the ice.

Almost every Canadian child has grown up and toyed with the idea of playing hockey professionally. To this day I can remember playing street hockey and coming around behind the net, stuck in an empty driveway, and slipping the tennis ball in backhanded. I never played on the ice, but I played in the neighborhood, so I recognize the dream in the eyes of the players.

Lightning introduces us to a team that comes from addiction, abusive families, low income and academic struggles, all of them dreaming of making it to the big show. When they are ousted from their usual league at the beginning of the season, and lose their coach (Ed Helms), the team finds a new league in Northern Alberta, and a battered coach and zamboni driver who lives in the local rink, Willy (Lightning).

Willy only takes the job for the money and the chance to pursue a hockey mom, Chanelle (Jana Schmieding), but when he and the team confront a system that seems determind to keep them down, and break them, the team begins to gel, and prove itself.

What I found truly engaging about this film is that each of the players and Willy the coach get narrative arcs, there are layers to the characters, motivations and dreams, all of which make them individuals, and their own person.

I would have liked to hang with some of the players a little longer, some of them, obviously, get more screen time than others, and they are all fascinating. Pauline Alexis, plays Jaycee, the only girl on the team, is a great character. We see her struggling not only with her future, but trying to hold her family together despite her partying mother, something she does as well and has to reconcile that within herself.

There are so many great moments throughout the film, and Lightning who penned the script with Samuel Miller deliver a film that has its laughs, but is defintely more drama-leaning, and that makes the film all the better. The laughs when they happen, come from authentic moments, not contrived gags or tropes.

From beginning to end, Lightning grounds his film and cast in reality, and consequently, they earn their laughs, and the cheers.

I absolutely adored this movie, from the perfectly on point casting, each of the cast members, brings their character to life wonderfully, to the camera work, smooth and objective when off the ice, and kinetic and tightly edited when the puck is dropped.

Funny, heartfelt, and authentic, Smudge the Blades is a winner!