It’s Electrifying: John Travolta to Depict one of the Hardest Jobs in the World in ‘Life on the Line’
Millennium Films
There are plenty of films about a variety of dangerous career paths. Firefighters, police officers, paramedics, that one where Ashton Kutcher is a Coast Guard, all branches of the military, construction crews, vigilante superheroes, lifeguards, pilots and conductors, detectives and inspectors, astronauts – they’ve all had their due. But one sector of selfless, high-impact human service has largely been ignored by the film industry: linemen. It doesn’t matter what kind, be it those who lay railroad tracks or those who install and repair electrical, telephone or telegraph wires. They’ve gotten the short end of the stick.
With the last film to commemorate their work premiering in 1937 (Slim the Lineman, which starred Henry Fonda), it’s now up to John Travolta and a merry band of brethren that includes Kate Bosworth and Devon Sawa to right this wrongs with Life On The Line. The indie drama, directed by David Hackl (Grizzly) and written by the team of Peter Horton, Primo Brown and Dylan Scott, will follow a crew of “eccentric” electric linemen as they fight the elements and presumably each other.
Life On The Line centers on the crew as face certain danger while fixing an electrical grid. But their lives aren’t just about electrical power, you see. It’s about the power of relationships and the electricity between the men and their women. Get it? Do you get it? This seems to be where Bosworth’s character comes into play, though details on her role are scarce. The men fixing the system are equal parts focused on their jobs and trying their best to love their women, and everything seems hunky dory up until a monstrous storm comes rolling through town, threatening their lives and their livelihood. Or, as Deadline puts it, the storm “threatens to rip their lives apart.”
While they’re probably just a peachy group of dudes, really upstanding citizens, one thing to focus in on is that they’re specifically described as “eccentric” linemen. Are Travolta and Sawa (let’s assume that they’re part of this ragtag group, as they’re the only males mentioned) going to participate in some wacky hijinks up on the high-wires? Is this why their wives all want to leave them? Eccentricity could mean that they’re creative in their wiring techniques, or that they’re just a bunch of wild and fun-loving guys who have a storm to get through, and really have that whole “we work with electricity” dilemma to deal with during the ordeal.
