The Man Who Broke 1,000 Chains
| The Man Who Broke 1,000 Chains | |
|---|---|
VHS cover
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| Screenplay by | Michael Campus |
| Directed by | Daniel Mann |
| Starring |
Val Kilmer Charles Durning Sônia Braga Kyra Sedgwick James Keach Elisha Cook, Jr. Clancy Brown |
| Theme music composer | Charles Bernstein |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) | Yoram Ben-Ami Michael Campus |
| Cinematography | Mikael Salomon |
| Editor(s) | Diana Friedberg Walter Hannemann Noel Rogers |
| Running time | 115 minutes |
| Distributor | HBO Films |
| Release | |
| Original network | HBO |
| Original release |
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The Man Who Broke 1,000 Chains is a 1987 American drama film directed by Daniel Mann and written by Michael Campus. The film stars Val Kilmer, Charles Durning, Sônia Braga, Kyra Sedgwick, James Keach, Elisha Cook, Jr. and Clancy Brown. The film premiered on HBO on October 31, 1987.
It is 1922. Robert Elliot Burns is having flashbacks of the horrors of World War I and is on the streets protesting for himself angry at his inability to find a job and society's apathy towards veterans. The next day, he is at his parents home and his brother Vincent, a minister, tries to console him. Elliot says he's had enough and wants to go down to Florida to find work.
Elliot is heading to Florida by train and by the time he stops outside of Atlanta, he is now a penniless vagrant. He joins a group of vagrants around a campfire that intend to rob him, but another man saves him from it. He offers Burns a chance to make some money by robbing a country store. Burns goes with the man to rob it, but tries to back out at the last second. The man holds him at gunpoint to rob the cash register, which contains only $5. The man knocks Burns out with his weapon and runs away, leaving Burns to be apprehended by local police. He is taken to court and his lawyer tells him he should plead guilty. The judge gives him a trumped up sentence of six to ten years hard labor.
Burns is taken to the Fulton County prison camp. It is a foul place consisting of wooden shacks, stocks, sweatboxes, and pure filth. He has iron chains attached to his legs and meets the warden, Harold Hardy, a fat, angry, and spiteful man of Irish descent who hates people from the North. Hardy calls him a "Yankee" and tells him to feel guilty and get used to chain gang life to make it easier on himself. He has one of his guards, Mr. Trump, escort Burns to his quarters. Burns is introduced to a foul shack of filthy, exhausted men and meets an elderly prisoner, Pappy Glue who laughs at him when he says he didn't commit the crime he was imprisioned for. He is introduced to an inedible meal of pig fat, bitter corn pone, and sorghum molasses and gags trying to eat it and gives his plate to a veteran prisoner enjoying and devouring it.
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