“Urban lacrosse is exploding,” Rod Allison, director and co-founder of City Lax in Denver, tells an enthusiastic, capacity crowd sitting before him. “The growth of the game and urban programs are about serving neighborhoods that did not previously know the game. And in essence, that is what City Lax is about.”
Braving unusual single-digit winter temperatures, more than 300 members of Colorado’s lacrosse faithful showed up to the Cable Center on the campus of the University of Denver Tuesday evening for the premier of the documentary, “City Lax: An Urban Lacrosse Story” that Allison was prefacing. Now three years strong and with 100 participants and growing, one of the organization’s first teams and the trials of starting such a program are chronicled all in just under 90 beautifully crafted minutes.
“City Lax” is not a mere documentary about lacrosse, however. Quite the contrary, it is an intensely personal narrative that exhibits the hardships of growing up in inner-city Denver, what it means to be a member of a family – whether real or constructed – and no matter the circumstances, the deeply-rooted spirit in us all to go on for the good of the community.
“At the end this is all about kids,” explains director Gabriela Cowperthwaite, a mother of two herself. “I hope that that came through, that this film is just about what’s special about every kid, and the responsibility of us to find a way to bring it out.”
Conceived of by Tor Myhren and Cowperthwaite – both Denver natives, who have since followed their respective careers to New York and Los Angeles, but were on-hand to debut their masterpiece – the story immediately situates the audience into the passenger seat of Erik Myhren’s tattered passenger van as he chauffeurs kids around Northeast Denver, to and from lacrosse practice. Erik Myhren is producer Tor Myrhen’s younger brother, and the person Tor says is the inspiration for the project.
After a bout with an undiagnosed illness that almost took his life, Erik, a longtime teacher at Hallett Academy Elementary School in Denver, dedicates a large portion of his time away from the classroom to providing less fortunate students with experiences that they would not have otherwise had the chance to enjoy. He tells of how on one such occasion, he introduced a handful of his 5th graders to some lacrosse sticks, and that these primarily minority students took to the sport much quicker than even he could have imagined.
Soon, he was hooked up with Allison, who followed a model originally composed by his then-high school son, and before the two realized it, they had formed a lasting partnership. More than that, they had built a roster of 40 eager, underprivileged kids, boys and girls, of all races and ethnicities – aptly coached by George Moore, a Denver resident who was the first black lacrosse player at the Naval Academy – and, as is a recurring theme throughout the movie, given them a simple opportunity.
From line drills in the schoolyard to the team’s first game against a local American Indian youth program, the viewer is given a visually stunning portrayal of the development of a number of these individuals with lacrosse employed as the catalyst in assisting them in breaking from the cycle of drugs, gangs, violence and ultimately, imprisonment or premature death. In order to show what these mentors are up against, the film perfectly illustrates the multitude of traumas that many of these 11 and 12 year olds have had to overcome, most notably failings in the classroom, the incarceration of parents and the death of immediate family members.
“Before we shot it, I thought it had a chance to work on a few different levels,” recalls Tor Myhren. “Nothing had really ever been done from a film perspective about lacrosse. And of course, the inner-city part of it adds that whole other texture, and I really thought that those two things put together had some human-interest qualities to it.”
If the raucous standing ovation following the opening screening is any sign of things to come, expect this picture, which took two years to produce, to garner plenty of talk – especially within the close-knit lacrosse community – as well as draw plenty of award consideration.
“A lot of the lacrosse community was here,” says Cowperthwaite of the packed house, “so they know the sport, but I don’t know if they know what something like that sport can do. It’s bigger than I think everyone thought, and transcends a sports season.”
She continues, “Whenever you do a film about kids, the message of hope is always the underlying message, and I just want that to be at the surface. Anything that we can do as adults, through sports, the arts – through whatever – and through lacrosse, to give a kid a chance to feel like they’re the best at something and all eyes are on them, even for two minutes a day, or two minutes a week, then we can say we’ve done our job.”
And the overall takeaway from this endeavor?
“What strikes me when I watch it now is that there are a lot of kids out there, like the kids in the film, that have these amazing talents that are completely unknown unless somebody is there to give them a platform to perform, or as Erik says in the movie, ‘Give every kid their time to shine,’” says Tor. “And I think about all of the kids that don’t get that chance, and how we as a society can help to have more of those kids have a chance like these ones did with lacrosse. Who would have known that they would be great lacrosse players?”
“City Lax: An Urban Lacrosse Story” is truly nothing short of supremely inspiring, and is a magnificently orchestrated ode to the triumph of the underdog, and the fruit that is beared from investment in the community through service.
Myhren and Cowperthwaite have submitted their work for approval to some of the biggest film festivals in the country, including Tribeca, Sundance and Los Angeles, and should hear back by February or March 2010 on if it has been accepted. From there, their primary objective is to just have as many people as possible view it, be it through word of mouth and the passing around of DVDs, or perhaps even theatrical distribution.
For more information about the documentary, please contact Myhren and Cowperthwaite via e-mail at info@citylaxthemovie.com, or visit their website at citylaxthemovie.com.
For more information about the Denver City Lax program, which has been granted U.S. Lacrosse BRIDGE affiliation, please contact Rod Allison at rod@denvercitylax.com, or visit denvercitylax.com, where a new website will be launched in the coming months.
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