Lock Up | |
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Theatrical release poster
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Directed by | John Flynn |
Produced by |
Charles Gordon Lawrence Gordon |
Written by | Richard Smith Jeb Stuart Henry Rosenbaum |
Starring | |
Music by | Bill Conti |
Cinematography | Donald E. Thorin |
Edited by | Don Brochu Robert A. Ferretti Michael N. Knue Barry B. Leirer |
Production
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Distributed by | TriStar Pictures |
Release date
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Running time
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115 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $24 million |
Box office | $22 million |
Lock Up is a 1989 American prison drama film directed by John Flynn and starring Sylvester Stallone, Donald Sutherland, Tom Sizemore, and John Amos. It was released in the United States on August 4, 1989.
Frank Leone, a skilled mechanic and football player in Hoboken, New Jersey, is a model prisoner nearing the end of his sentence in Norwood, a low security prison. He occasionally spends time outside prison in his garage fixing cars, playing football and spending time with his girlfriend Melissa.
One night, while sleeping in his cell, guards arrive and forcibly take Leone to maximum security Gateway Prison run by Warden Drumgoole. Drumgoole explains to him, that he will serve hard time, because he escaped once from Treadmore and did so on Drumgoole's watch. He escaped because his mentor and friend was dying; Leone was refused even one hour to see him so Leone escaped to visit him and went to the press about the warden's treatment of his prisoners, resulting in Drumgoole's transfer to Gateway and Leone serving five additional years in minimum security before his transfer.
Leone is mistreated by the guards and the boss of the inmates, Chink Weber, who is Drumgoole's muscle appendage. There he befriends fellow prisoners Dallas, Eclipse, and First-Base, and shows them his concept of freedom that has helped Leone go on: that the body may be confined to one place, but "your mind can be wherever you want it". The foursome refurbish a Ford Mustang, which Eclipse nicknames "Maybelline". Leone explains to Eclipse that he was sent to prison for taking the law into his own hands when he avenges an attack on his father. After Leone reluctantly allows First-Base to start the car he refuses to turn it off and drives the Mustang out of the garage. Drumgoole makes them watch as inmates destroy the car and Leone is subsequently sent to solitary confinement for six weeks. There Leone is tortured by the guards who wake him at random points in the middle of the night, forcing him to face a security camera and dictate his name and prisoner number. However,the guards' captain, Meissner, and one other guard become so disgusted with the crude sadism of the warden and his toadies that Meissner orders it to stop and releases Leone from confinement.