Ryan McFadden

10848238

Pop Culture Paper

Ignorance of Sports Films to Recognize Their Weaknesses

The film industry has been a medium used to display the proper ways to behave

within American society. Sports films have continued to be at the forefront of

implementing the appropriate ways to display masculinity for men. Culturally sports

films and the characters in the films continue to be iconified by men in America. Films

from the 1970s are a great representation of the extremities that masculinity is taken to, as

ignorance of the subjects of sex, gender, race and sexuality were more prevalent due to

the fact that they were all recent developments in mainstream society. The two films

studied are Slapshot and North Dallas Forty. Both of these films have been deemed as

classic sport films. However both films fail to consider the effects they have on society as

a whole. Sports movies in the 1970s such as Slapshot and North Dallas Forty are

mediums used for reaffirming masculinity in men while in turn reaffirming the femininity

in women.

Masculinity is necessary to be projected outwards and insecurities are to be

hidden inside. The only times that man will show his insecurities is in private moments.

In both movies the dare not show any insecurities in front of women they just met as the

goal for the night would be to sleep with these women and the insecurities would hinder

that from occurring.

In both movies the only time men will show their insecurities is when they are

with another teammate privately or when they are with a woman after sex. In both

movies, after sex is when the players feel it is acceptable to talk about how they feel in

front of women. Don Sabo describes this as a “cloak of masculinity,” where men will put

on a façade of mythic masculinity that truly is a covering of the fact that men are

vulnerable (296). Men will continuously try to show their strength, especially in front of
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the opposite sex. Men are taught to hide the signs of weakness and are policed by other

men to keep them in check and ignore the inner feelings of insecurity.

In these films men show that it is necessary to police each other into being

masculine. The men police each other with the usage of words like pussy or fag. Some of

the players in the movie Slapshot are French-Canadian. These players have trouble with

the English language. In a scene on the team bus while playing poker after one of the

French-Canadian players loses a hand and exclaims, “ I lose my blouse” (Slapshot). Right

away the other players correct him to replace blouse with shirt. This policing of ones

manhood is showing how men do not wear blouses, however men wear shirts. This can

be seen as a direct correlation with the theory of the Act-Like-a-Man Box. Paul Kivel

says that we are “taught to fear that we are not manly enough and that we might be gay”

(148). By the reinforcing of the people around us to keep us in the box and refuse us from

straying outside the box in anyway we are doing more damage than can be seen

outwardly. Kivel goes on to say that no one is born into this box; it takes years of

unhealthy reinforcement to get adolescent males to accept the life inside the box (150).

Once we are able to find away to exist outside the box we will truly be able to live as who

we are as a person without the outside influence of others.

In both movies the men do whatever it takes to play their respected game. Each

movie has scenes were the men are tired and worn down so they consume an assortment

of pills to get them through the game. Win at any cost is a common theme in sports

movies. In North Dallas Forty the players have a conversation on how they view their

bodies as a machine. It is their mind that is their true self. So harm to the body is just part

of their game. One player goes as far to say, “when I feel the most pain is when I feel the

most secure” (North Dallas Forty). This player is reiterating that with pain comes some

sort of value in himself. Pain is a sign that he is doing right in his mind. “Male tolerance

of risk and injury in sports is not a socially passive but rather is one through which
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violence, injury, and disablement become reframed as masculizing by society at all

levels” (Pappas 577). This tolerance by men can be damaging to one’s body but the body

is seen here as a toll rather than an entity on which life exists. Since risk and injury

becomes a sign of masculinity that is reaffirmed through society, men will continue to

risk injury to prove them as manly. Historically in Greek and Roman cultures sport has

been rooted in pain, fear adulation, vain and glory (Fitch, 88). Violence has been the

deriving factor in the development of sport. Is obvious to see why men have become

violent in correlation with sport.

In both movies that were analyzed the male body is objectified and romanticized.

The men are often seen without shirts on and displaying their bodies as an exhibit. In

North Dallas Forty there is a major scene where the men are lifting weights. This

romanticizing of the male body leads to the idea that male bodies have to have this

Greek-god like physique. There is often dialogue about competition with one another in

who looks more manlike. Differentiated attitudes and behaviors are thus reinforced for

males as a result of gender appropriateness, and aggressive behaviors are particularly

representative of this categorization process (Coulomb-Cabagno 1993). Aggression is just

one form of how men display their masculinities. Men see by developing one’s own body

they behave in gender appropriateness. The development of one’s body to look strong is a

way for men to affirm their gender.

In a bar scene in the movie Slapshot, one player is getting his love for his wife

questioned by his teammates because of the continued fighting that they do. One player

suggests that maybe he is a faggot. As in maybe he is fighting with her so he could get

out of the relationship and start with his homosexual life finally. The response by another

player is very disheartening. After being asked, he says, “Are you kidding? He has a big

cock like a horse” (Slapshot) Here they are discussing how it would be impossible for

one man to be a homosexual. Concentrating on the phallus, the man is saying that if your
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penis were larger than average being homosexual is wasteful as it would be seen as a gift

that should be shared with women. By having a large penis, it automatically makes it

impossible for you to be homosexual.

One scene in Slapshot, they players are forced to do a fashion show at a

department store. Not one of the men likes the idea of wearing the fancy clothes and

parading around in front of women. One player actually says that he looks like a “cock-

sucking faggot” (Slapshot). The adjective being used here is the emphasis that is to be

questioned. Calling himself a faggot would be one form of hate but he goes on to

emphasize that he looks like a gay man that also gives oral sex, as this would be seen as

even a worse thing. The players are trying to reclaim their manhood that is taken away

with the fashion show experience.

In Slapshot a man’s wife ends up leaving him for a woman. Twice during the

movie the theory is brought up that if his wife was a “dyke” that mad him a “faggot.”

This is showing that men believe that lesbianism is an emasculating form of sexuality for

men. It would not be emasculating if a woman left her husband for another man.

However if she leaves for woman the husband’s masculinity gets stolen away. This

feeling comes from the idea that the husband is inadequate and cannot satisfy his wife.

He is seen as so inadequate as a man that a woman is able to fill in for the needs that he

was unsuccessful in pleasing. Men feel that a lesbian relationship is a way for men to lose

power over the women and are reverted back to being homosexual, as they no longer can

please a woman. The movie shows the reason for men to be homosexual is because they

failed in their attempts to please a woman. “Men’s violence against women and gay

bashing is a learned behavior” (Katz 167). This idea of acceptability for such violence is

continuously reaffirmed throughout both movies. These sports films make it suitable for

the violence to be a way of life. Violence against women and homosexuals is taught to be

the correct way to act.

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In Slapshot there is a scene where two men are betting on if they can get a women

to go home with them. This is a common practice among men. Here the men are

objectifying the women. They are reverting women from being people back to being an

object that is there for one to win. By betting on women these men are forcing the women

into a subordinate position in the hierarchy of gender relations. Women are lower on the

ladder making them less than men.

Many times in the movie Slapshot we see a man that is continuously checking up

on his ex-wife. Even after the couple has parted ways he still believes he owns her. When

he is on a road trip he continues to call her house and have people around town spy on

her to watch for the men she may be dating. This sense of ownership over his ex-wife

could be seen as a form of plantation patriarchy. He feels that sense he was once married

to her that he has the right to control every aspect of her life. Again the idea of a woman

is being reduced back down to a piece of property that a man owns. Within highly

competitive sports there can be a spillover of aggression that is projected on females

outside of the sports realm (Bloom 75). Men can engage in different forms of violence

towards women but the violence can directly be associated to violence in their respective

sports.

In Slapshot there is a very prominent role of a female actress that shows signs of

masculinity. She was continually seen without makeup, wearing pants and talked about as

a more masculine person. Her demeanor was more masculine also; the way she spoke

gave her a more masculine persona. She was often praised for standing up for herself.

However by the end of the movie it was decided that she needed to be more ladylike. She

was “fixed” up wearing a dress and makeup. This shows that women need to be feminine

in order to exist alongside men. Her husband who she had been arguing with

continuously throughout the film now had a new found attraction to her thanks to the new

“fixed” image.
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While in the locker room in Slapshot the men are watching television before they

start their game. They happen to be watching an exercise show that shows a woman

dressed completely in pink tights. The exercise she is doing is stretching out while she is

saying, “push that pelvis way up there” (Slapshot). While watching this all the men are

deeply concentrated on the woman figure and are enamored with the image. Here the

men are once again objectifying females while more concentration is now put on the

body of women.

Also in both of the sports films studied there is an underlying theme of white

supremacy. Both films show the owners of the each professional team reaffirm

hegemonic masculinity. The owners are both upper class white people. These characters

help to reiterate how the lower class is dependent on the upper class for survival. In each

of these movies the players try their best to get control of their respective situations. The

players perform outstanding at their respective games trying to get back some power that

they were lacking. However, the owners again flex their own muscle to show no matter

who they players were or what they accomplished they were still owned by the team

owners. The owners then showed how little power the players had and made business

decisions that helped benefit the owners rather than the players. The white supremacists

views are hidden but prevalent throughout both films.

The two classic sport films studied, Slapshot and North Dallas Forty, fail in

recognizing their ignorance to sex, gender, race, class and sexuality. These films have

been devotedly watched by for over thirty years. Throughout this time people have

learned the ways Hollywood would want you to act. Even though the subjects taught by

these films are incorrect in their premise, they have never been corrected or brought to

attention. Slapshot has continued its course in molding the minds of America has there

have been two more movies in the series to further portray the ignorance to these
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subjects. These films have a goal to entertain but this comes at the cost of portraying a

hegemonic masculine discourse for society to follow.

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Annotated Bibliography

Bloom, Gordon A. and Michael D. Smith. “Hockey Violence: A test of Cultural Spillover
Theory.” Sociology of Sport Journal 15 (1996):65-77.

Coulomv-Cabagno, Geneviève and Olivier Rascle. “Team Sports Players’ Observed

Aggression as a Function of Gender, Competitive Level, and Sport Type.” Journal
of Applied Social Psychology 36.8 (2006): 1980 – 2000.

Fitch, Trey J. and Jennifer L. Marshall. “Faces of Violence in Sports.” Faces of Violence:
Psychological Correlates, Concepts and Intervention Strategies. Ed. Daya Sandu.
pg 87-102.

Katz, Jackson. “Reconstructing Masculinity in the Locker Room: The Mentors in

Violence Prevention Project.” Harvard Educational Review 65.2 (1995):163-174.

Kivel, Paul. “The Act-Like-a-Man Box.” Men’s Lives. Ed. Michael S. Kimmel and
Michael A. Messner. Pearson. Boston:2007 148-150 .

North Dallas Forty. Dir. Ted Kotcheff. Perfs. Nick Nolte, Mac Davis. Regina Associates,
1979. DVD. 2000.

Pappas, Nick T., Patrick C. McKenry and Beth Skilken Catlett “Athlete Aggression on
the Rink and off the Ice: Athlete Violence and Aggression in Hockey and
Interpersonal Relationships.” Men’s Lives. Ed. Michael S. Kimmel and Michael
A. Messner. Pearson. Boston:2007 575-590.

Sabo, Ken. “Masculinities and Men’s Health: Moving Toward Post-Superman Era
Prevention.” Men’s Lives. Ed. Michael S. Kimmel and Michael A. Messner.
Pearson. Boston:2007 287-300.

Slapshot. Dir. George Roy Hill. Perfs. Paul Newman, Michael Ontkean. Universal
Studios, 1977. DVD. 2002.

Weinstien, Marc and Michael Smith. “Masculinity and Hockey Violence.” Sex Role
33.11 (1995): 831-847.