VIDEO BRIDGES' SPAN NEVER FLASHY, BUT ALWAYS INTRIGUING.

Byline: Rob Lowman Entertainment Editor

Last week, Jeff Bridges received a nomination as best supporting actor for his role as President Evans in ``The Contender.'' Though he just turned 51, Bridges has proven to be one of Hollywood's most durable and underrated actors in his more-than-30-year career (50, if you count his uncredited cameo as an infant in a 1950 movie).

The tragic death of Dale Earnhardt on Sunday in a crash on the final lap of the Daytona 500 brings to mind a role that Bridges played in the 1973 film ``The Last American Hero,'' a fictionalized story of Junior Johnson, a real-life stock-car driver who won Daytona in 1960, the second time the race was run.

Johnson (known as Jackson in the film), like Earnhardt, was from North Carolina. As some articles appearing in the wake of Earnhardt's death pointed out, stock-car racing arose partly out of the illegal whiskey trade in the South. And this is how the story of Jackson (Bridges) begins, as he makes deliveries for his bootlegging father, avoiding authorities as he tears through the back roads of Carolina. But when his moonshine-making father is arrested, Jackson joins the race-car circuit to raise money for his legal fees.

``The Last American Hero'' is one of those small gems that never exceeds its ambitions. Though there is action on the race track, ``Hero'' succeeds because it is character driven and the weight of the film rests on Bridges, who is simply terrific. It's the scenes in which Bridges is acting alone (as when he's calling home) that are among the best in the film. Actors talk about ``getting it real,'' and in such scenes, Bridges gets it real - all the confusion, the loneliness of a young man being away from home and unsure of his future, are quietly up there on the screen - so subtly that you almost miss how good it is.

By the time he did ``Hero,'' Bridges already had his first Oscar nomination, for his role as a high-school football star in the 1971 film ``The Last Picture Show,'' and was already seen as a star (especially coming from an acting family - father Lloyd and brother Beau). Even though Bridges over the years has been in a number of hits and even received two other Oscar nominations - for his supporting role as Clint Eastwood's goofy sidekick in ``Thunderbolt and Lightfoot'' (1974) and as best actor in John Carpenter's 1984 sci-fi film ``Starman'' - he has never reached the box-office status of, say, Jack Nicholson.

This may be partially due to luck, or Nicholson's vs. Bridges' choices of roles, or, it can be argued, any number of other reasons. For me, however, it has a lot to do with style. Nicholson's roles are more flamboyant (think of his Randle Patrick McMurphy in ``One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest''). Many of the characters that Bridges has played are introspective or outsiders, the extreme case being his extraterrestrial in ``Starman.''

``Hero'' didn't do much at the box office, and neither did the 1976 film ``Stay Hungry,'' directed by Bob Rafelson, who had worked with Nicholson on a number of films (including ``Five Easy Pieces''). Bridges plays Craig Blake, another lost soul - this time from an aristocratic Southern family - who hooks up with a group of new Southern hustlers trying to swing a real-estate deal in Atlanta. Blake's job is to buy a rundown bodybuilding gym cheap. Along the way, though, he becomes enamored of the sport and the offbeat people who inhabit the place. Based on Charles Gaines' novel, which was semi-autobiographical, ``Stay Hungry'' did wonders for two of Bridges' co-stars, rescuing Sally Field from her image as the Flying Nun and introducing us to a new force in films, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who - duh - plays a bodybuilder.

Unfortunately, Bridges didn't get much notice. Nevertheless, he has continued to turn in one terrific performance after another. He may not win an Oscar, but the moviegoers have been winners over the years. Check out Bridges in these films (all should be available at your video store): ``Bad Company,'' ``Hearts of the West,'' ``Cutter's Way,'' ``Jagged Edge,'' ``Tucker: The Man and his Dream,'' ``The Fabulous Baker Boys'' ``The Fisher King,'' ``American Heart'' and - my personal favorite - as the Dude in the Coen brothers' offbeat comedy ``The Big Lebowski.''

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Photo: (1 -- 5) Oscar nominee Jeff Bridges has done some of his best work in, from left, ``Tucker: The Man and His Dream,'' ``The Big Lebowski,'' ``The Fisher King,'' ``The Fabulous Baker Boys'' and ``Starman.''