Rugby Movie - Forever Strong

I really enjoy rugby. I don't fully understand it, but all of my brothers play, make it the final four championships every year and give me a chance to fly out to Palo Alto to see the play offs and a few relatives. This is the first year in a while where no brother will be playing. But, when Brett comes off his mission, I'm sure he will be back on the playing field and I'll have another trip to look forward to.

A new movie will be coming out in September - Forever Strong. It's based upon a true story about the Highland rugby team (Utah high school) , but that's about all I know. Oh, wait, that's not all I know.

My brother Craig is in the movie playing rugby. He, along with a lot of other All-American rugby players from BYU and University of Utah in 2006, are real rugby players in the movie. The town they filmed in is outside of Toelle, Utah. The town is smaller than Toelle - so it might not actually be a town. I know, I was there. At least for one day. Believe it or not, I had to sleep in my rental car at a truck stop the night before because Salt Lake City had so many conventions that week. All hotels were booked in every direction. After driving around Toelle type towns (late at night- spooky feeling) and finding no hotels (not even Bates hotels), I finally realized I'd have to do the Hawaii vacation trick. That would be putting t-shirts over all the windows and trying to squeeze my six foot frame into the backseat of the smallest size rental car. Those kind of experiences are only good for journal entries at later dates. Anyway...off topic at hand.I sat next to this dummy in the stands and pretended to cheer. We weren't allowed to make any noise while we cheered. Silent cheer. I guess I had nothing else to do while I sat and waited for my brother to finish playing in some rugby scenes.

The players received free food for their efforts...and some exercise and bruises. Some of the volunteers that sat in the bleachers won free iPODs. I'm not sure how free that is after you've had to sit in the sun for 8 hours, but it was amazing to see the characters that came out of the woodwork to participate and await the chance to possibly win an iPOD and receive an over baked hot dog.

The main characters didn't know how to play rugby when they started shooting the film. Craig said they were told to be a little gentle when the main characters were running with the ball or being mauled. I would say tackle, but not sure if that is a rugby term.

Anyway, it should be a good movie. If anything, you will get to hear and see the rugby players doing a hauka (hakka?) dance at some point which is always interesting.

Other links:

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMsVEyesEeM


• http://www.rugbymovie.com/


• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forever_Strong


• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brigham_Young_University_Rugby_Team


• http://www.byurugby.com/