Product Description

A semi-fictional account of life as a professional Football (American-style) player. Loosely based on the Dallas Cowboys team of the early 1970s.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #21226 in DVD
• Brand: Team Marketing
• Released on: 2001-01-30
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .0" h x .0" w x .0" l, 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 118 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
A very savvy, 1978 film directed by Ted Kotcheff (First Blood) dealing with the seamier side of professional football. Phillip Elliott and Maxwell (Nick Nolte and Mac Davis, respectively) are players for a Texas football team loosely based on the championship Dallas Cowboys. Though at the peak of his football career, Elliott is a personal and physical mess, needing all manner of drugs prescribed by the team physician to play and even to move around. The indifference of the team management and the hypocritical stance toward recreational drug use versus the drug abuse practiced by the players leads to a crisis of conscience for Nolte. The combination of Nolte's volatile presence and Davis's understated performance as the quarterback who thinks he's seen it all helps make North Dallas Forty one of the best sports films around. --Robert Lane

Customer Reviews

Pro football exposed
Phillip Elliot (Nick Nolte), an aging wide receiver who must be injected with pain-killers in order to perform, faces the end of the life he loves as he sees his career slipping away. Aware of his position in a fundamentally corrupt system that demands everything of the players, then discards them when they are used up, he nevertheless puts up with it for the sake of the thrill he gets on the football field every Sunday and the joy of doing what comes naturally to him.

If you're looking for an uplifting sports film with a rousing last minute win against overwhelming odds, look elsewhere. This movie is an expose of pro football as big business in which the players are expendable commodities. There is scarcely any game footage in the film until the very end, and even then it subverts sports movie conventions. Unfortunately, the love story in the film is unconvincing, even though it is intended to serve as a dramatic foil to the dishonesty and manipulation Elliot faces in his professional life. It's not surprising that Dayle Haddon didn't go on to much of a film career following this performance. However, it is surprising that singer Mac Davis didn't make more of a splash on the big screen, since he is so good here.

1970s tale with heavy resonance for today
This might be considered the perfect teammate for "The Longest Yard" but it stands on its' own. A big reason for that is the startling performance of singwriter-singer Mac Davis. He got his character *down* - not too deep of a dude, but deep enough to step to Nolte at the end and say that he knew that his buddy was under surveillance and that suspension was next. He proved to be a buddy on the field but not "off the field".
The athletes must work with those who they dislike and distrust. As in any occupation involving more than one individual.
Nolte is no road scholar but is a little older, wiser, roadweary enought to be tired of the detached powers-that-be and their strategy meetings with tired motivational techniques and condescention. Not exactly tired of illegal substances to keep on keel, however. He meets a somewhat enigmatic, free spirit at a typical brawling, baudy pre-big game bash - I'm not clear on how she knew about it or why she would want to attend. She is the absolute perfect balance to all the rough dudes he has to live and perform with and her peaceful demeanor starts to work on him. In the end, shell-shocked over his own decision to chuck-it, he turns to her for...regrouping. Davis will continue playing football - and have no Love in his Life. Nolte will do the converse.
The writing, directing, and cutting here is of a very high order, the attention to detail amazing. I am no fan of this sport but I had no desire to break it up in quarters - the picture flows.
Other performances of note are by Charles Durning, the old-timer trying to keep the young guys focysed and the front office smiling. But he doesn't seem to buy his own exhortations, and he delivers some interesting facial expressions to support that. Dayle Hadden is the understated counterpart to all the riotous action, perhaps a tad too refined and mannered - though that was the '70s. Today she would have been portrayed as the exasperated divorcee who has had it with immature men and masculinity in general.
Some nicely low-lit Love scenes provide peaceful interlude to the mayhem coming in the next frame.

North Dallas Forty
Ted Kotcheff's revealing "North Dallas Forty" uncovers the less heroic aspects of pro football as big business, depicting players as commodities to be replaced when their broken bodies give out, coaches as bullying nursemaids, and owners as greedy, manipulative tyrants. To his credit, Kotcheff isn't heavy-handed in his approach, leavening the film with plenty of wit and warmth. Nolte is superb playing the aching, rebellious Phil, while singer Davis exhibits natural acting chops as Max. Sterling support comes from Steve Forrest and Dabney Coleman (as owners), G.D. Spradlin and Charles Durning (as coaches), and Bo Svenson (hilarious as an unhinged defensive player on the Dallas team).