This Is Where I Sleep - Bréanne
2013 · 5m · Canada
Directed by Annick De Vries, Ernest Godin, Eza Paventi
Genres: coming-of-age, documentary, sports
Tones: contemplative, tender
Winnipeg hockey player Bréanne competes with her team and wins competitions, training toward a future as a professional player in a sport often treated as boys-only.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
On paper this is exactly the sports doc everyone expects—underdog girl breaks into boys' club, inspirational arc, the works—but De Vries, Godin, and Paventi seem oddly uninterested in selling that story, which is almost interesting enough to save it.
A competent portrait of athletic ambition situated squarely in the documentary tradition of intimate sports portraiture, though it doesn't quite achieve the formal distinctiveness or archival weight that would elevate it beyond solid craft.
The real move here is the tonal restraint—in five minutes, the directors let Bréanne's quiet determination and the texture of locker-room light do the work rather than reaching for obvious emotional beats, and that disciplined choice transforms a familiar premise into something genuinely felt.