Word: spradlin
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...Pete Spradlin was four when his father was killed in a local mine at 27. Pete was taken in by his grandfather, whose skull was crushed in a cave-in when Pete was 13. Now, at 44, Spradlin works the same rolling seam of coal -- Chilton, it is called -- that his father and grandfather did. Each morning Spradlin enters the Bantam Mine, crouching to clear the sign that reads WORK SAFE AND ENJOY LIFE. But Spradlin has had his own close calls -- a gashed lip that took 16 stitches, a couple of cracked ribs, a broken finger, two teeth knocked...
...gentle and reflective man, Spradlin weighed the career risks before taking his place in the coalfields. Now, after two decades of inhaling coal dust, he tries to ignore a nagging cough but privately frets about black lung. Says his wife Ruby: "I think it's probably the most hazardous job a man could have. If he's late for dinner, I wonder what's happened...
...vividly rendered) behavior at work and play; he struggles to give Elliott an intelligence beyond the character's ability to articulate. The star is well supported by Mac Davis, as a smooth ole star quarterback who's learned to get ahead by going along, and by G.D. Spradlin as the head coach, Charles Durning as the assistant coach-enforcer, Steve Forrest as the owner and Bo Svenson as an animalistic lineman...
Benson, who doesn't even look like a jock, plays a heavily recruited high school hoop star who chooses fictional Western University in Los Angeles, a perennial basketball power. Any parallels to UCLA, it seems, are purely intentional. The coach, played by one W.D. Spradlin, even clutches a rolled-up program during games, a quirk college hoop fans will immediately recognize as the trademark of John Wooden, UCLA's fabled Wizard of Westwood...
...game. Of course, he goes absolutely wild, running around and jumping up and down like a madman while his teammates stand around and giggle helplessly. Benson is a fair actor, but his part doesn't demand all that much besides wide-eyed innocence, with an appropriate burst of emotion. Spradlin turns in a solid performance as the fiendish coach, and O'Toole is passable as the lover. The worst thing about the film is a pitiful score written by that misbegotten little nitwit, Paul Williams, and performed by those masters of Muzak, Seals and Crofts...