A lot of what I know as a filmmaker is because of hockey. That's teamwork, and being able to collaborate with people, and be creative with them, and get the most out of everybody. Everyone's got different talents, and you've got to bring out the best of everybody, and use your strengths and work together, and try and evolve it rather than do what was done before you, and to push into new areas.

I found a lot of stuff that's never been seen before. That was the goal: to not use cliché Cold War footage but give people a sense of the place and setting. It's a field you still need. At first it was a lot of fun, and then later it became a little bit intimidating. "Oh my God, I've got so much footage. Where am I going to put it? What am I going to do?" I ended up really only reviewing about 20 to 30 percent of what I had. So it was a task.

Anatoli Tarasov, the guy that created the Soviet style of play, was a visionary. He was a creative thinker. He studied ballet and chess and art and read a lot.

There (in the Soviet Union) it was a science. In order to be a coach, you had to study in school.

In the U.S., coaches could be the father next door. They had no formal training. They're like old hockey players. They don't go to school and study.

My parents are from the former Soviet Union, from Ukraine, and I grew up wanting to be a professional hockey player.

Sports is like literature. People watch it and if it's beautiful and it's non-violent, whatever messages that you see, people can read into it and say, "Wow! You know what? Whatever they're doing over there, it's extraordinary, and maybe that culture is superior to ours in certain ways."