Indie Watch
Goon
By Dan Krovich
March 13, 2014
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Goon
When it comes to great hockey movies, the list has pretty much begun and ended with Slapshot with maybe The Mighty Ducks thrown in for the younger set, but Goon takes its place as a surprising new hockey movie classic. Goon is loosely based on real life minor league hockey player Doug Smith. Seann William Scott plays Doug Glatt, a kind-hearted but dimwitted bouncer at a bar in Massachusetts. As part of a family of Ivy League educated doctors, Doug suffers from a major league inferiority complex. One night at a minor league hockey game, Doug knocks out a player who has climbed into the stands to start a fight and catches the eye of the coach.
Doug is signed by the Halifax Highlanders to serve as the team’s enforcer and to protect their star player Laflamme, who has NHL talent but has never recovered from being knocked out by Ross “The Boss” Rhea (Live Schreiber) three years earlier. Doug is not much of a hockey player, but he excels at being the enforcer and responds to finally finding his calling and being accepted as a member of the team. He also responds to local girl, Eva (Allison Pill), and they begin a romantic relationship despite the fact that she has a boyfriend.
Meanwhile, Ross “The Boss,” who is a legendary enforcer at the end of his career has been sent down to the minors after his most recent suspension. After years on the job Ross has become weary of the demands and has announced his retirement at the end of the season. As the Highlanders make a run at the playoffs there is more anticipation about the possible confrontation between new blood Doug and old guard Ross than the score of any hockey game. The film builds towards their confrontation, particularly a late night conversation between the two men in a bar. Then, during their climactic battle, the film actually reaches the operatic heights that earn the right to use Puccini’s Turandot as the film’s score.
Scott gives perhaps the best performance of his career. Where he often has played loud-mouthed characters in the past, he plays Doug with an understated earnestness that makes his character immediately endearing, and he shows deceptive range in what first appears to be one-note. Goon is a film with a lot of heart, and the beat of that heart is Scott’s performance.
With all of this talk about operatic heights and heart, it should not be lost that this movie is actually a fairly raunchy comedy. The movie is very funny and full of lowbrow humor, but it is elevated by not just concentrating on the jokes and realizing that even scatological humor can be more effective when you take the time to establish connection to the characters and the story.
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Available at Amazon
Available at iTunes
Available at Vudu