🔴 Condition - Very Good 🔴

This is the true story of William Hayes (Brad Davis), caught at Istanbul Airport in 1970 with 2 kilograms of hashish taped to his body. What follows is a powerful story of the living hell that is jail in Turkey, and other places, initially for a five year term, but just short of release a term that was increased to 30 years. Along the way we meet the assorted characters that populate jails, such as Jimmy Booth (Randy Quaid), Max (John Hurt), Tex (Bo Hopkins) and the sadistic chief guard Hamidou (Paul Smith), that filled Billy Hayes life for five years of that hell, before he finally escaped to Greece and home to New York in 1975.
Based upon Billy Hayes book of the same name, and written to recoup the $30,000 his father had spent trying to get him out of jail in Turkey, this was adapted for the screen by Oliver Stone. In all, the quality of the film resulted in six Oscar nominations in 1979, including best picture, winning two - best screenplay adaptation for Oliver Stone and best original score for Giorgio Moroder. But even more than that, this film created a controversy at the 1978 Cannes Film Festival (the Turkish Government attempted to prevent its release) that led within weeks to talks between the US and Turkish governments for prisoner exchanges.

EXTRA FEATURES
Featurette - I'm Healthy, I'm Alive and I'm Free (7 mins)
Filmographies - Cast & Crew