Dated

Maciste_Brother

Professional football was all the rage in the 1970s and a phenomenon Hollywood recognized. Several football movies were made in the 1970s (and some non-football movies, like ROLLERBALL) which were inspired by the violent sport's massive popularity. NORTH DALLAS FORTY was made to satiate the thirst of avid football fans to see what they weren't been shown on regular television broadcast: drugs, violence, sex and cursing. So ND40 basically plays like a voyeuristic behind-the-scenes look at what goes on in a professional football team. My favorite such scene is the party at the beginning. But in this context, the film looks positively dated. The fact that there are almost no African American football players in the team should tell you how dated it is. And the idea that a player is being hounded by the team's owner because he's too much of a rebel reeks of that silly and ubiquitous anti-establishment theme seen in too many movies of the 1970s.

The actors do what they have to do with the script. Most of it is forgettable. Dayle Haddon (remember her?) looks like Sylvia Kristel's frosty sister. And Nick Nolte and Mac Davis basically play themselves. BTW, it's nice to see that Nick Nolte looks as bad in this 1979 film as he does (25 years later) today.

score 4/10

Maciste_Brother 14 April 2004

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw0169721/