Miracle: The Boys of '80 Documentary Recommendation

Bison,

I made a note to myself to take up the recommendation of Baron Powell and Keith Downing and view Miracle: The Boys of '80, the newly released (January 30, 2026) Netflix documentary on the 1980 US Men's Ice Hockey team and its journey to gold in the 1980 Olympic Games in Lake Placid. I just finished watching the film, and I want to echo the recommendation to you all. The film is remarkable, especially in the many ways it brought back our experience on our team, with our coach, half a century ago.

I don't know that I've ever been so moved by a film as this one. It's simply extraordinary, eloquent and poignant on so many levels. The documentary as a cinematic form made the film story of the team as real as the actual story itself. The backstories of the lives of the players, their blue-collar, working class childhoods, their parents who had nothing to give but their love, the ethic to work hard in the players formed from this history, deeply personalized the film. The political and national backdrop of tensions between the US and the former USSR transformed the story into one of being an American and not just of being an athlete. The narrative dynamic of the film, with the players at present watching film footage of their games, footage some hadn't seen, and commenting on the past from the perspective of the present, is emotional, with players crying over the memory half a century later. And the parallels between Herb Brooks, the coach, and Art Gulden are amazing, not only in their coaching philosophy, but in the players' view of Brooks. At times I thought they were talking about Gulden, not Brooks, the parallels so vivid.

If you get a chance, you might want to see it.

--Bob