Review of Midnight Express (1978) by Adele I — 17 Dec 2009

A pretty good movie, though considerably slow and very boring. What I did enjoy were the moments leading up to his being caught, which I thought was well done and acted; but considering he showed more emotion then than after he had gotten his bare feet smacked by a wooden bat 10 times while hung upside down butt-naked in a Turkish prison he'd be serving for 3 years is very unrealistic and stupid.

I expected some full-fledged weeping, at least a tear or two, but that didn't come until later. Then, two notable scenes are when he speaks out against the Turkish court and later goes berserk and bites out some guard's tongue, then is thrown in an insanity ward.

oh, yeah, I forgot--spoiler warning! Anyhow, the ending was stupid--how he leaps like a little kid in the middle of the street after escaping, how cliche could that be? Besides that, it was a decent movie.

Only because it's based on a ridiculously amazing true story did it win an Academy, but otherwise it's simply overrated.