Sling Blade (DVD)

note: also appears on my film review website, ShaunMunro.co.uk, thanks! Billy Bob Thornton's Sling Blade, adapted from George Hickenlooper's short film Some Folks Call it a Sling Blade (which also starred Thornton), earned a "Best Adapted Screenplay" Oscar win, as well as a "Best Actor" nomination for Thornton, who pulls triple duty in writing, directing and starring in this bitingly effective document of a fish truly, tragically out of water. Thornton plays Karl, a mentally handicapped man who has spent the last twenty five years of his life in a mental hospital for killing his mother and her lover when he was a child. We meet ...  Read the complete review

Sling Blade, a cult 1996 drama, was written and directed by Billy Bob Thornton, who also plays the memorable central character Karl Childers. Sling Blade begins with the mentally impaired Karl in a psychiatric institution where he has been living since the age of 12 after murdering his mother and her lover - with what he calls a "sling blade". After catching them in a compromising position Karl became confused and believed the man was attacking his mother. When he realised this wasn't the case he then killed both of them. All these years later Karl, regarded as a fairly gentle soul and liked by the hospital staff, is deemed fit for release back into society ...  Read the complete review