DETROIT – A new film on the life and career of legendary Detroit Red Wings goalie Terry Sawchuk will hit the big screen in Southeast Michigan this month.
“Goalie," which stars Mark O’Brien, Kevin Pollak and Georgina Reilly, will screen at several Emagine Theaters locations around Southeast Michigan, starting on Jan. 30.
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Emagine Theaters showing the movie include locations in Canton Township, Rochester Hills, Novi, Saline, Birmingham, and Royal Oak.
Sawchuk played two stints with the Detroit Red Wings during the 1950s and 1960s when goaltending was an entirely different type of position than it is today. There were no facemasks and padding was sparse, to say the least. To be a goalie was to be a different type of person altogether. As his contemporary Gump Worsley put it, “My face is my mask.”
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Sawchuk is still regarded as one of the best -- if not the best -- goaltenders ever to play the game. He busted into the NHL in 1950 and won the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year. He won the Vezina Trophy four times as the league's best goaltender. He won three Stanley Cups with the Red Wings and a fourth one with the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1967. He held the record for shutouts (103) for 46 years until Martin Brodeur broke it in 2009.
His life off the ice was checkered with a documented battle with untreated depression, alcoholism and weight loss issues. He also apparently had a strenuous relationship with Red Wings general manager Jack Adams.
Sawchuk died in 1970 after suffering internal injuries from a fight with one of his New York Rangers teammates. The death was ruled accidental.
Watch the trailer for the film below:
“The life of a professional hockey player was not always a glamorous one. For legendary goaltender Terry Sawchuk, each save means one more gash to his unmasked face and one more drink to numb the pain. Even with a wife and seven children at home, he is haunted by the void left from his childhood which he tried to fill with cheering crowds. Sawchuk traveled across the country racking up 103 shutouts and 400 stitches to his face, proving that this is a man who lives, breathes, and dies a goalie.”