Product Description

SUSPENSEFUL JOURNEY INTO DEADLY CONSPIRACY & MURDEROUS DECEPTION BEGINS WHEN A RESPECTED PROFESSOR, WHO MAY OR MAY NOT BE GUILTY IS CHARGED WITH A BRUTAL CRIME. THE FINAL TWIST WILL BLOW YOU AWAY.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9100 in DVD
• Brand: UNI DIST CORP. (MCA)
• Released on: 2003-07-22
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French, Spanish
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish
• Dubbed in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 130 minutes

Amazon.com
Kevin Spacey (American Beauty) plays David Gale, a brilliant but hard-drinking anti-death penalty crusader on death row for a rape and murder that he claims he didn't commit. The victim of the crime is Gale's close friend and anti-death penalty colleague (Laura Linney, You Can Count On Me), so Gale argues that he's been set up to discredit the cause. Committed journalist Bitsey Bloom (Kate Winslet, Titanic) takes it upon herself to figure the whole thing out--and so we follow her through a ridiculous plot full of supposedly shocking twists that are telegraphed far in advance and make very little sense when they arrive. The overwritten script tries to cover too many hot-button issues and gives Spacey way too many showy scenes where he gets to be passionate and caring, which is creepier than his psychopath roles in The Usual Suspects and Seven. --Bret Fetzer

From The New Yorker
A hyper-articulate and, at times, heartfelt movie, but a mess nonetheless. Kevin Spacey stars as a philosophy professor and anti-death-penalty advocate who winds up on death row in Texas. Laura Linney plays his academic and protest-movement colleague, whom he allegedly raped and murdered. Kate Winslet turns up as an ace investigative reporter from New York who finds the last-minute evidence that may exonerate him. Some of the academic atmosphere is knowing and fun, and Spacey and Linney have a couple of lovely scenes together, but the thriller mechanics of the movie (it's plotted against a clock) insult the audience. At the climactic moment, Winslet's rented car stalls like a dumb burro, and she has to run through what appears to be the entire state of Texas. Alan Parker directed, and the script was written by an ex-philosophy professor, Charles Randolph. The filmmakers' point of view regarding the death penalty is so confusing that no two sane people could agree on what it might be. -David Denby
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

See the film before the reviewers barricade its effect
THE LIFE OF DAVID GALE is, I believe, a much better film than many fellow reviewers would indicate. Perhaps they are influenced by the reviews that came out in the media at the time of the film's theatrical release, perhaps the Editorial slam on the Product Page by Bret Fetzer taints opinion. I would urge you to see and/or buy this DVD, keep an open mind, and witness the effect on your own emotional response.

Kevin Spacey fleshes out the title role as a believable philosophy professor who speaks against capital punishment in the state of Texas which just happens to be the place where more executions are performed than any other state. He is not without problems: alcohol, a drunken sexual relationship with a former student, and an awkward but deeply significant relationship with Constance (Laura Linney) who later when found 'murdered and raped' on videotape results in the arrest and conviction of Spacey's Gale, now facing death on death row. Laura Linney is most credible as a driven anti-death penalty activist for reasons we discover are beyond the range of civil rights reponsibilty. The third part of this triangle is the reporter brought in to investigate Gale's claim to innocence in the last four days of his wait on death row. Kate Winslet captures all the parameters of this contemporary woman with seamless detail. To tell more of the story would be injurious to the unfolding of this worthwhile drama.

For a 2 hour plus movie THE LIFE OF DAVID GALE manages to hold our interest, encouraging us as viewers to keep our invetigatory eyes and ears open and struggle along with Winslet and her cohort to finally put together all the pieces of the puzzle. Others have complained that the clues are in every scene: isn't that true of most crime investigations? I see no fault in placing all the information in front of the audience to test the observation of the viewer as much as the skill of the screenwriter in resolving a case with the important message of this film. Alan Parker uses a lot of visual tricks in addressing the facts of the crime and even makes interesting parallels in the background music (the fairly obvious metaphor of TURANDOT arias by the presuicidal Liu appear repeatedly).

In the end this story is on a par with DEAD MAN WALKING as far as a significant plea for anti-Capital Punishment voices. See it for yourself. The skills of actors like Kevin Spacey, Laura Linney, and Kate Winslet pledging belief in this script can't be ignored.

you'll probably feel cheated, and maybe insulted
This would have been a boring propaganda film except for some frenzied camera work and many clues and events designed SOLELY to keep you from turning off the propaganda. In fact, the whole plot line with the "journalist racing against time to find out the truth" is nothing more than a red herring to keep you watching. Surprisingly, the putative "real" theme (propaganda against the death penalty), is ALSO a red herring. Therefore, most people will feel cheated after being deceived by this movie.

The real theme that permeates every minute of this movie is that there are two types of people in this world, and the death penalty is merely a litmus test to distinguish them. People who oppose the death penalty are intelligent, educated, and caring people who know how to have fun, and those who disagree (Republicans) are stupid mean racists. Examples of the people the movie targets are Texans, George Bush, people with southern accents, and even people who wear cowboy hats and drive pickup trucks. Therefore, many people will be insulted by this movie.

If you want to see this film because it opposes the death penalty, you may still feel cheated and insulted because it contains nothing you will find new, thought provoking, or an example of how to be persuasive. However, the movie IS persuasive. It is masterful in its consistent but subtle demonization of Republicans, Southerners, etc.

All who are for capital punishment ought to be hanged!
My review title is a joke I once heard, but it is a much less convoluted oxymoron than this movie! I give it three stars for its suspense through most of the plot, which makes it never boring, and for some compelling acting. But through twists that repeatedly undermine the story you thought you were buying into, the film ultimately becomes self-destructive. I've seen it said in various reviews that this movie promotes an anti- death penalty agenda. Well, it sure does seem to much of the way through. But in the end I found myself seriously asking if this film might really be a joke that those reviewers never caught on to. I can really see supporters of capital punishment getting the last laugh here, having a field day in the end, however much they might have been put out with what they perceived along the way as propoganda. After mulling over this movie for a while, I grew to feel a little pride in my never having been a strong zealot one way or another on the capital punishment issue. For the film certainly shows how zealots for a cause can become fanatics who contradict the very principles that attracted them to the cause in the first place. And that amply happens to death penalty opponents in this case. If death penalty advocates want to make a case that opponents are not morally grounded and will sell out their very principles in an effort to promote them, the opponents of the death penalty in this movie have played right into the hands of such criticism. The supposed heroes of this movie think they've won a definitive victory that can't be turned against them. But instead they have done the ultimate in turning of their own cause on its head, and give the other side more ammunition than ever. I'll get no more specific, to avoid spoilers. There is suspense enough here to keep your interest. Just don't expect it to make coherent sense in the end.