Football Triple Feature -The Longest Yard North Dallas Forty Necessary Roughness-

Longest Yard - In this rough-and tumble movie, actually filmed on-location at the Georgia State Prison, the cons are the heroes and the guards are the heavies. Eddie Albert is the sadistic warden who'll gladly make any sacrifice to push his guards' semi-pro football team to the national championship. Burt Reynolds plays one-time pro quarterback Paul Crewe, now behind bars for leading State Police on a wild chase in a "borrowed car" and more. He agrees to organize a prisoners' team to play the guards. The warden intercedes to assure that his goon squad will meet only passive resistance from Crewe's "Mean Machine." But the license to pound on their hated guards is a big incentive for murderers and thieves to learn strategy. North Dallas Forty - In a society in which major league sporting events have replaced Sunday worship as the religion of choice, North Dallas Forty appears like a desecration at the altar. In this film, directed by Ted Kotcheff (The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz), the National Football League is revealed to be more about the money than the game. Nick Nolte is North Dallas Bulls pass-catcher Phillip Elliott, whose cynicism and independent spirit is looked upon as troublesome by team coaches Johnson (Charles Durning) and Strothers (G.D. Spradlin) and team owner Conrad Hunter (Steve Forrest). Elliot, at the end of his career and wise to the way players are bought and sold like cattle, goes through the games pumped up on painkillers conveniently provided by the management. His teammates include savvy quarterback Maxwell (Mac Davis) and lunk-headed defensive lineman Jo Bob Priddy (Bo Svenson), who deal with the impersonality and back-biting of the game through off-field diversions. When the Bulls management benches Elliot after manipulating him to help train a fellow teammate, Elliot has to decide whether there is more to life than the game that he loves. Necessary Roughness - The Texas State Armadillos are fourth down and nowhere-to-go after a corruption scandal nearly ends the football program. Now upstanding coach Ed Gennero (Hector Elizondo) must put together a brand-new team. For the position of quarterback, Gennero recruits Paul Blake (Scott Bakula, Quantum Leap), a 34-year-old former high school star whose field of dreams turned out to be the family farm. Blake still has the arm, but can he score with a team that includes a samurai linem