"Do they really hate each other?" Teemu Selanne and Brett Hull play over-the-top versions of themselves in Minor Leaguer, the latest hockey film to poke fun at the game.

Teemu Selanne and Brett Hull will feature in their first movie roles when Minor Leaguer is available to own or rent as of Aug. 1. Here's an excerpt about the movie from Ronnie Shuker's article in The Hockey News' Top 90 of the ’90s issue.

It was at the Montreal Forum where Brett Hull first got caught in Teemu Selanne’s cross-hairs, or so the story goes. 

Selanne was in the midst of his record-shattering 76-goal, 132-point rookie season with the Winnipeg Jets when their paths crossed at the 1993 NHL All-Star Game, while Hull was on his way to his fourth straight 50-goal, 100-point campaign with the St. Louis Blues. In three games against each other to that point, each had scored a goal, with Hull adding four assists. 

But at the Forum, Selanne and Hull were set to be on the same team, part of the Campbell Conference all-stars in the days before the NHL ditched history in favor of geography. As natural-born goalie killers, there was a mutual respect and admiration between the two future Hall of Famers. That is, until Jeremy Roenick, then a hot-shot center for the Chicago Blackhawks and an inveterate prankster, tapped Selanne for the ol’ mouse-in-a-hockey-bag gag before the game.

Unknowingly punked by Roenick, Selanne screwed his eyes as he searched the dressing room for the culprit. For whatever reason, his eyes, and his ire, landed on Hull.

With that, hockey’s most unlikely cinematic rivalry would come to life in Minor Leaguer.

“A lot of people who’ve seen the trailer have asked me, ‘Do they really hate each other?’” said director and sole producer Dan Comrie.

With Roenick’s reputation, coupled with the obvious onscreen chemistry between Selanne and Hull, the backstory for the rivalry in Minor Leaguer is so believable it could almost be true. 

Set for release on Aug. 1, the movie follows career minor-leaguer Jake McKay (played by Comrie), whose lifelong idol, Selanne, buys his minor-pro team, the Hemel Hawks, in the Old West Hockey League. When Hull gets wind of the transaction, he tries to get in on the action by buying his own team, while Selanne pulls out all the stops to keep his archnemesis out. The rivalry plays out off the ice, with Selanne and Hull playing themselves, in a manner of speaking.

For Hull, his character is a virtual doppelganger. 

“Well, to be honest, and I think you know who I am, I thought it was a perfect fit for me,” Hull said. “I thought the character basically was me.”

For Selanne, though, his avatar is far from reality. 

“In the movie, I’m an egomaniac, and everything is about me,” Selanne said. “So, it’s a narcissistic way to see that it could be me actually, in theory. But it’s totally opposite. Luckily, thank God, I’m not like that guy.”

Minor Leaguer is a labor of love for Comrie, born out of a lifetime in the game. He comes from a longstanding hockey family, whose lineage begins with his father, Fred, a draft pick of the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1973, and runs through Dan himself, as well as his cousins, Mike and Paul, both of whom played in the NHL, and on to cousin Eric, currently the backup goalie for the Buffalo Sabres.

“It was the perfect project for me,” Comrie said. “Hockey’s in my blood. I’ve watched and played it my whole life.”

As a 16-year-old, Comrie was on a path to pro hockey himself, as a promising rookie with the USHL’s Lincoln Stars in 2003-04 with a full scholarship to the University of Denver pending. Then, just three games in, Comrie found himself in a neurologist’s office being told never to play hockey ever again after his brain began hemorrhaging from a hit that had led to yet another concussion.

“It was a tough decision to make at such an early age and having the next basically five years planned out for myself, but I had to make the decision to retire,” Comrie said. “I actually learned a lot about myself during that time, in a good way. That you can’t sulk about stuff, and it’s just a sport. There are a lot of other people in the world going through tough things. It matured me at a young age.”

Comrie left Lincoln and drove back home to San Diego to finish high school. As it was, he went against doctor’s orders and played non-contact roller hockey and, later, local beer-league hockey. Then, on a follow-up visit three years later, Comrie’s diagnosis changed when the same doctor who told him his career was over gave him the all-clear to play full-contact again.

Still eligible for junior, Comrie called the Stars back in Lincoln. In the span of three days, he went from goofing around with 50- and 60-year-olds in the empty stands of beer-league hockey in his hometown to playing in front of a full house at the 4,300-seat Ice Box in Lincoln, Neb. In 20 games, Comrie had eight goals and 17 points. More importantly, he found closure.

“It was a fun little thing to experience the road and all that stuff that I didn’t really get to experience,” Comrie said. “But ultimately, after those 20 games, I received another concussion, so that was the final chapter in that book, and I was just happy to close it and move on and go into the working world.”

When life after hockey came earlier than expected, Comrie got a job in the corporate-video world. He worked on his own projects on the side, including an idea for a full-length feature in which a real-life humble Hall of Famer plays himself but as a megalomaniac.

“We thought Teemu Selanne would be the perfect cast for the ex-NHLer because he’s known as such a good guy, one of the most classy, humble guys in the sport,” Comrie said. “So, to see him playing an egomaniac, we thought, would be hilarious. At the time, it was just Selanne, but then we thought it’d be great to have an archenemy, and we thought no other better one than Brett Hull.”

This is an excerpt from Ronnie Shuker's article in The Hockey News' Top 90 of the ’90s issue, in which former minor league hockey player Dan Comrie's new movie Minor Leaguer is put under the microscope. Here's Adam Proteau with the history of hockey movies:

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