This is just awesome on a whole bunch of levels and brings back a ton of memories as well. You’ve perfectly captured the tone and mood of the industry when most of our hockey movies were produced. And though it technically wasn’t Canadian, you could have included “Youngblood” which was shot in Toronto and Hamilton and got my vote as the best “Wannabe Canadian” movie of its time.

I remember attending the Toronto Premiere of “Face Off” because I was doing a CBC movie with Trudy Young and she had a couple of extra tickets. Met Art Hindle that night forming one of those long-distance actor friendships that has lasted since.

I also happened to be working with Peter Pearson when “Paperback Hero” was released. One of the best directors this country ever birthed. We won’t talk about the massive crush I had on Dayle Haddon. But as a side note, we might be the only guys still around who saw both “Rancho DeLuxe” and “92 In The Shade” during their theatrical runs. I may be wrong, but I think Elizabeth Ashley was in those movies because she was involved with McGuane at the time.

I can’t disagree with anything you said about “Slapshot” or “Hounds” and thoroughly enjoyed “Goon”, but I think there are still some great hockey themes waiting to be explored, along with films about Alan Eagleson and Harold Ballard that need to be made, but probably couldn’t be shot in Canada.

Mostly, thanks for the tales about your dad. There’s so much about that generation of Canadian men that has also never been explored by our cinema. Guys from places with nothing who generated their own local myth while earning the admiration and respect of others who came from similar nowhere towns and had nothing to work with and yet managed to build the world we were born into.

It’s a storyline those whining about the country’s apparent lack of support for or appreciation of the Arts could take to heart.

I’m sending everybody I can to read this.

Thanks Again.

Jim Henshaw

The original Hairspray was fantastic, I was horrified when it was made into a musical and another film… tho’ I’ve never seen either, so I really shouldn’t judge, LOL.

Although, The Ninth Configuration is hardly hard to sit through – it is, in fact, one of the finest films ever made. It and the book on which it is based are Blatty’s crowning achievements as a filmmaker and author respectively.

In his Trilogy of Faith, it is The Ninth Configuration that most expertly conveys its themes.