Slap Shot (1977)

Reggie (Paul Newman) is coach of the Charlestown Chiefs ice hockey team. Their popularity is waning, and the economic downturn of the general area means the paying audience that they need to stay afloat just isn't there. Salvation comes when an outbreak of extreme violence on the ice strikes a chord with the fans; angry at a faceless system, they crave blood. The more of it that gets shed, the more popular the team becomes.
I don't personally consider Slap Shot to be a 'sports' movie, but it's a movie and it has sporting action, so call it what you will. What's important is that it stands strong by avoiding the woeful clichés that often plague the genre. And while it has a lot of comedy, it's played straight, not slapstick. Even the most violent members, the three Hanson brothers, are bloody hilarious at times.

3½ crazy pucks out of 5

Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)

I don't know who said 'don't judge a book by its film,' but I've a feeling that he or she would approve of my using it here. Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five (1969) is a modern masterpiece and one of the few novels that I'd recommended to all, no matter what their regular reading habits may be. It really is that good. The film, sadly, isn't its equal. It's much too bleak; and while the odd humour is there, it's too often buried under the severity of the imagery. Vonnegut's Billy Pilgrim has become unstuck once more, this time in film, but it's from arguably his own unique narrative voice.

2½ humiliations out of 5