Film on Roosevelt High girls' basketball set for world premiere

Seven years ago, Ward Serrill attended a Roosevelt High girls' basketball game. Excited by the energy and emotion that the athletes brought to the game, he asked coach Bill Resler if it would be all right if he brought his video camera next time, to perhaps make a documentary about Resler and the team.

The coach agreed, though not without a few misgivings. "I remember thinking, 'that's an odd thing to want to do,' " said Resler last week, chuckling at the memory.

Not so odd, as it turns out. The documentary that resulted from this seven-year journey, "The Heart of the Game," is about to have a fortuitous debut.

Serrill, Resler and star player Darnellia Russell will be in Toronto next month to attend the film's world premiere Sept. 10 at the prestigious Toronto International Film Festival.

Liz Manne, who was a key player in the release of the 1994 basketball documentary "Hoop Dreams," has signed on as co-producer and sales agent for the film, and Serrill hopes the Toronto fest will bring a distribution deal that would take his made-in-Seattle film — shot mostly at the Roosevelt gym — to theaters around the world.

"I am in awe of the journey right now," said Serrill. "It really is a labor of love that's gotten bigger than me. It's really opening its own doors right now."

Big hearts on the court

Information

For more information on "The Heart of the Game," see www.heartofthegame.org.

Serrill, a 48-year-old native Seattleite who is executive director of the film and video department of the social cause public-relations firm Pyramid Communications, at first thought his film would just be about that first season.

He was dazzled by the athleticism he saw on display, and by what he described as "the raw unbridled passion and enthusiasm they had for playing the game. I said to myself, our culture has forgot about this in its mania for winning."

He filmed for a year, hanging out at practices and games; capturing, in Resler's words, how "it's not about winning and losing, but about how hard you tried, how you overcome obstacles, emotionally how you rely on other girls and how they rely on you."

And the charismatic Resler, a tax professor at the University of Washington (and father of three daughters) who coaches for love of the game, proved to be an irresistible subject. After that first year, Serrill thought he just might have a film.

End of story, perhaps? Not yet. Resler remembers, after that first season, hearing from the gym teachers about a new girl at Roosevelt, named Darnellia. "I went to meet her," he remembered. "I called Ward up immediately, and I said, 'I think you want to keep the camera rolling.' "

A star is born

At 5-foot-6, Darnellia Russell is tiny by her sport's standards. But put a basketball in her hands and she becomes larger than life. Serrill remembers the day she first walked into the Roosevelt gym to work out with the team. "I said, 'I've been waiting for you,' " said Serrill. "Here's this edge and attitude and really kind of a quiet, silent defiance to her, and God-given extraordinary basketball skills."

In a film full of vivid portraits, Darnellia emerges as the central figure of "The Heart of the Game," as Serrill follows her journey from inexperienced freshman to star point guard to grown-up woman, with a few bumps along the way.

"When she was a freshman, she wasn't really into being a team player," said Resler. "[She was] a marvelous, gifted athlete, but not about the team. That's what she learned at Roosevelt. She became the consummate team player. Like having another coach on the floor. [Whatever team] gets her will have won the lottery."

Some drama took place in Russell's life over the course of the filmmaking — to elaborate further would be to rob the reader of the film's journey — and much of the latter half of "The Heart of the Game" focuses on Russell and how she faced those challenges, on the basketball court and off.

"I think the movie is going to teach a lot of youngsters that if you make mistakes you can fix them, and still have a wonderful life," said Resler.

In the film and now, Resler speaks warmly of the qualities Russell brought to his team — and continues to bring, after her graduation. "I learn a lot about basketball from these girls," he said last week, noting that Russell is still an influence over his team. "The girls, if they did poorly, in part of their heart, they will feel that they're letting Darnellia down. She embodied the spirit of what we're all about."

Russell, now 21, currently attends North Seattle Community College and plays in the Northwest Athletic Association of Community Colleges league, in which she recently scored a personal-best 49 points in a game.

She's hoping to transfer to a four-year college on an athletic scholarship after this year (Oregon State, she says, has been in touch with her), and dreams of someday playing in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA).

She attended the first Seattle screening of a not-yet-finished print of "The Heart of the Game," at the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) earlier this summer, and smiles at the memory.

"I was just in another world," she said, "looking around at all those people, in that big theater." Off the court, Russell is soft-spoken and calm; still processing the experience of seeing her life on the big screen. People already come up to her at work (at a North Seattle mall eatery) and say they recognize her from the film. "All of it seems like a fairy tale, actually," she says.

Red carpet world premiere

Serrill, Resler and Russell — old friends from having spent so many hours together — will all travel to Toronto next month for the world premiere. Buyers from numerous film distributors will be there, on the hunt for a hot acquisition, and Serrill's film — which does not currently have a distributor — arrives with plenty of buzz behind it.

"The most pragmatic hope is that there is a major distribution deal," said Serrill, who admits that he fantasizes about possibly more than one studio vying for it.

"That would be the best-case scenario. Beyond Toronto, I hope the message of this film goes all around the world a bunch of times. I hope it just gets seen by tons and tons of people. Whether there's an economic return to that, or not, that was never the intent."

Serrill notes that more than 150 people, including many members of the Seattle basketball community (including former Sonics owner Barry Ackerley and his wife, Ginger, the Seattle Storm and many more) have offered financial support to the film.

"One thing I did was really consistently reaching out to the community to support this, as opposed to getting private investors and giving away half the film," he said. "I felt a huge responsibility to get it done. So many times, I didn't know how to do that, where to go with it, how to finish it up, how to tell a story that would bring it all together. But on the other side, it was touched by its moments of grace and luck and angels."

Resler, who will bring his entire family to Toronto for the premiere (daughters Jessica, Alexa and Vanessa and wife Sherry, with whom he will celebrate a wedding anniversary during the festival), thinks audiences everywhere will connect with the film's story.

"What struck me most as I watched the movie [at SIFF]," he said, "is what a marvelous job Ward has done of capturing the emotions that high-school kids go through, in such dramatic fashion. When you watch that movie, you can just feel the emotion pouring up the screen. Lots of times I get a little teary-eyed when I see the movie. It was a really emotional ride."

The ride continues in Toronto next month. Stay tuned.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com.

She will be at the Toronto International Film Festival Sept. 8-14.

Correction: Information in this article, originally published August 25, was corrected September 23. An incorrect age was given for "The Heart of the Game" director Ward Serrill. He is 48, not 38.