Red Army

Red Army (2015) is a documentary you can watch online on iFILM. Director Gabe Polsky tells the story of Soviet hockey through its captain, Slava Fetisov — a film where the sport turns out to be politics by other means.

The heart of it is the famed CCCP five-man unit that ruled international ice for years. Fetisov walks us through his arc from beloved national hero to a man the state turned on, the moment he pushed to leave and play abroad. Polsky stitches together old footage, glimpses of Anatoli Tarasov's punishing training methods, and candid, sometimes prickly interviews, so that behind the rinks you start to see the whole late-Soviet world: discipline, pride, and the weight of the system. On camera Fetisov is charming and stubborn, cracking jokes one minute and cutting straight to the bone the next. It'll grab longtime hockey fans and newcomers curious how sport mirrors a country alike. No syrup, just real people. Stream Red Army (2015) online on iFILM.