This Sporting Life ( Criterion ) CC1458L ( 0136 )

Set in the fictional city of City, the film is about Frank Machin, a bitter young coal miner from the West Riding of Yorkshire. The first part of the story is told through a series of flashbacks when Frank is anaesthetised in a dentist's chair, having had his front teeth broken in a rugby league match, and recovering at a Christmas party. The second part takes place after he has fully regained his senses, and proceeds without flashbacks.

Following a nightclub altercation, in which Frank takes on the captain of the local rugby league club and punches a couple of other players, he asks a scout for the team, whom he nicknames "Dad", to help him get a tryout. Although at first somewhat uncoordinated at the sport, he impresses Gerald Weaver, one of the team's owners, with the spirit and brutality of his playing style during the trial game. He receives a large signing bonus to join the top team as a loose forward (number 13) and impresses all with his aggressive forward play. He often punches or elbows the opposing players—and sometimes even those of his own team.

Off the field, Frank is much less successful. His recently widowed landlady, Mrs Margaret Hammond, a mother of two young children, rebuffs Frank's attempts to court her and treats him rudely and abrasively. She lost her husband in an accident at Weaver's engraving firm, but received little financial compensation, because the death was suspected to be a suicide. One day, Frank takes Margaret and her children to play in the River Wharfe next to Bolton Priory. Another time, Margaret gets annoyed when Frank comes home drunk. He desires her sexually and, eventually, grabs her and forces her onto his bed. Her daughter interrupts them, but then she acquiesces and they have recurring sexual relations.

At Weaver's Christmas party, Frank quarrels with Weaver and his predatory wife, whose advances Frank had rejected previously, much to her chagrin, and it is clear that he has lost Weaver's favour—though Slomer, the team's other owner, now supports him more fastidiously. When he gets home after the party, Margaret agrees to share his bed to keep him warm, as he looks unwell with his swollen face and missing teeth. But, in her grief, she cannot really return his affection, saying she is scared to invest her feelings in one person, as they might abandon her or die. She sometimes insults him, referring to him as "just a great ape", and, on their first proper date, Frank insults the staff and flaunts protocol at the fancy restaurant to which he takes her. Margaret is embarrassed and leaves, and the scene is witnessed by the Weavers, who icily shun him.

Maurice, Frank's friend and teammate, gets married, and Frank and Margaret attend the ceremony. When Frank goes over to congratulate the couple, Margaret walks away. She says she feels ashamed, like a kept woman, especially since Frank bought her a fur coat. He strikes her, and then says he thought she was finally becoming happy. On another occasion, she says that their neighbours think she is a slut and she and the children are not "proper people" because of Frank. They have a row, and Frank goes out drinking with Maurice. He says he wants another job, "something permanent", and believes Margaret needs him, though she does not realise it.

Frank tries to talk to Margaret, but she defends her privacy, saying he knows nothing about Eric, her deceased husband. He says she drove Eric to suicide, and Margaret, outraged, demands that Frank leave as she starts throwing his belongings out of his room. Frank says he loves her, but she is furious with him. Eventually, he goes to stay at Dad's cheap boarding house in a bombed-out area, leaving his Jaguar incongruously parked outside.

Intending a reconciliation with Margaret, Frank returns to her house where he is met by their neighbour who says she is in hospital. The doctor tells him that Margaret is unconscious, having suffered a brain haemorrhage, and that she may not have the strength, or perhaps the will, to survive. Frank sits with her, holding her hand and talking gently. Distracted by a large spider on the wall, when he looks back at Margaret, blood seeps from her mouth, and she dies. In his rage, Frank slams his fist into the spider, killing it. He does not speak to the children or their minder when he leaves the hospital. Returning to Margaret's house and breaking in by the back door, Frank wanders through the empty space and calls out her name before collapsing in tears.

In the closing scene, Frank is seen on the rugby field, now exhausted and vulnerable to the ravages of time and injury.