North Dallas Forty
Director: Ted Kotcheff
Year Released: 1979
Rating: 1.5
Battered-and-bruised wide receiver Phillip Elliott (Nick Nolte) clashes with his head coach (G.D. Spradlin), his assistant coach (Charles Durning), management and some of the other players on his professional football team, the North Dallas Bulls (... but really the Cowboys). Rambling in terms of 'plot' - Nolte just drifts around, drinking beer and smoking - and full of tiresome machismo and locker room banter (homophobic slurs, cat calling ... cliché stuff, really), it says considerably less about the details of the sport (or Nolte's personal relationships) and much more - and here is its sole strength - about the physical toll the sport has on the body: all the injections, pain pills and surgeries needed to play a violent and incredibly popular American past-time (and one in which I love and follow: go Raiders!). In recent years, HBO has been doing a remarkable job with their "Hard Knocks" series, detailing the pre-seasons of select teams, which covers on-the-field and off-the-field issues in a less frat-boyish and more professional way (albeit in a different era than this movie takes place).
