Best Actress: Susan Sarandon
The best thing I can say about Dead Man Walking is that it's a conversation starter.
Whether you're for the death penalty or not, whether you think criminals and murderers can be redeemed, what you think of religion is all on display in this film. It's a quieter film that follows a simple story: Susan Sarandon plays Sister Helen Prejean, a nun who's been asked by a death row inmate played by Sean Penn to provide religious counsel to him in the week leading up to his death.
Sister Helen has never done this kind of advocacy work before and she struggles with reconciling what Matthew, Sean Penn's character, has done and how to balance working with him when she sees the effects it has on the families of his victims, with her religious community, and with the people she helps at her regular outreach job.
There's a lot of moralizing, but it's never preachy, and it never seeks to transform your opinion. It's a very straightforward story: there's a murderer, he did unspeakable things to two teenagers, and he's going to die for them (spoiler alert: he does die by lethal injection at the end of the film). In between, Sister Helen has to reckon with how a just God can offer redemption to him while also recognizing that he's pretty much a piece of shit, and it's barely even hidden under the surface. He does a terrible jail cell interview in which he says certain WWII personalities weren't all that bad and that he wants to come back as a terrorist so he can blow up buildings ("not with people in them" is his hasty defence of what he said).
Susan's character seems almost naive in comparison to the rigid hardline viewpoints espoused by the victims' families (that Matthew deserves to die for his actions) and the murderer (that he doesn't want or deserve to die, only expressing remorse in his literal final minutes). She's never persuaded to change her stance, that she is a religious counsellor for a death row inmate, and that God redeems all, but she's put through the ringer, emotionally, as she amasses all these viewpoints and opinions.
I do have to say that it didn't change my stance, I don't believe that's the point of the movie, either. It's more about how do you reconcile who a person is with what they've done, knowing that they have to pay a price. Susan, throughout, is a gentle, calming, motherly presence who advocates her position while also being aghast at how hardline and cold the whole process is.
It's a mesmerizing, but understated, performance. And that being sad, I'm not sure if it was Oscar-worthy, in my opinion.
Susan was nominated against Elisabeth Shue (Leaving Las Vegas), Sharon Stone (Casino), Meryl Streep (The Bridges of Madison County), and Emma Thompson (Sense and Sensibility). I'm not going to lie, it's kind of baffling to see that line-up and to know that Susan bested them all. I have to assume there may have been some vote splitting?
It's a great performance, but when is Susan Sarandon ever phoning it in? I'm just not sure, looking back at who has won an Oscar, that it stands up against some of the other performances.
DID I LIKE DEAD MAN WALKING? Meh.
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Did you like Dead Man Walking? What are your thoughts on Susan Sarandon's Oscar win?
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