Final Rating: 2.5/5
A down-on-his-luck former hockey player becomes coach for a reserve’s failing under-18 team in the Canadian film Smudge the Blades. Writer, director, and star Cody Lightning’s (Hey Viktor) sophomore film juggles edgy comedy with heavier melodrama touching on domestic abuse and alcoholism but can’t quite nail the delicate tonal balance.
Blades centres around the Treaty 6 Blades, an all-indigenous team in Edmonton. In their first game as part of Edmonton’s U-18 league, the team is suspended after coach (and former Edmonton Oiler) “Brutal” Bud Bradshaw (Ed Helms), fails to reign in his most aggressive players, and is subsequently dropped. The team’s search for a new coach brings in Billy Lowe (Lightning), a former New York Ranger and current Zamboni driver. Over the next few months, Lowe is tasked with leading the team out of their suspension, and back to success before the players move away for university.
Blades takes cues from the likes of Bad News Bears and The Mighty Ducks, with a bad coach and a bad team coming together to make each other better. Lowe is only interested in being coach because of a crush on one of the players’ moms. On multiple occasions, Lowe skips entire periods in favour of drinking in the pub across the street. Fending for themselves, the kids are disorganized, frustrated, and even disinterested in hockey after a string of failures.
Lowe’s initial reluctance to do his job comes from his own failures. His time with the Rangers was cut short after injuring his wrist, his career since having evaporated and left him squatting in a hockey arena collecting cans and begging for scraps between shifts on a Zamboni. He’s a burnout, a functional alcoholic, and has his own experiences in a broken home. Lowe immediately recognizes the problems his players deal with daily, and he also recognizes their talent.
Lowe is an unlikely coach, but the perfect person to bring out the best of the Treaty 6 Blades. He’s good at identifying who should play what role and how to harness his most and least aggressive players. Just as importantly, he’s great at recognizing when he or his players are being screwed over.
The best sequence of the film features Lowe giving his players the worst speech imaginable after learning the referee is taking bribes from the other team’s coach. “You’re going to lose this game,” he says, “so let’s make it worth it.”
Aside from Lightning, the standout performance comes from Paulina Alexis, playing the team’s only female player, Jaycee Pipestem. Alexis delivers a layered performance as a girl forced to step up as the head of the family while her alcoholic mother neglects all responsibilities. Pipestem, a talented hockey player, struggles with the responsibilities at home and her dream of going to college for hockey. If she gets in, will her sisters survive without her? Will her mother?
Lightning as a director creates powerful moments. Lowe is put through the emotional wringer a half-dozen times, while Pipestem and other players’ home lives lead to harrowing depictions of broken homes. Lightning is less adept at stringing those moments into a cohesive whole. Too often, characters will stagnate between Big Moments.
At 102 minutes, much of the time feels misused, with characters growing in bursts rather than continuously. More disappointingly, Smudge the Blades doesn’t feature that much hockey, which also would have provided great opportunities for more visual storytelling.
In all, Blades is a competent underdog sports story but does little to stand out. Like the team at its centre, all the right people are there, but unlike the coach he plays, Lightning can’t quite figure out how best to use them.
Smudge the Blades was seen during the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. Thank you to Route504 for the screener.
