The Life Of David Gale Film About Capital Punishment

The Life of David Gale is a Hollywood film that dealt with the controversial theme of capital punishment. It tells the story of one David Gale, a philosophy professor and a champion against death penalty, who himself will get the verdict of capital punishment for alleged rape and murder of his colleague. Kevin Spacey stars in the title role along with Kate Winslet as a young journalist ready to take the challenge of proving his innocence. The movie was directed by Alan Parker.

The Life of David Gale brought Nicholas Cage along with Alan Parker to produce this thought-provoking drama. Written by Charles Randolph, the movie was distributed by the Universal Pictures while Jake Parker, Michael Seresin and Gerry Hambling were the composer, cameraman and the film-editing respectively. This two and half hour length flick came out in 2003.

The Life of David Gale narrative shows how well-reputed David Gale, a professor came to lose his job and family due to one trick from a girl student. Gale, broken, gets into alcoholism. He is comforted by a fellow activist of Deathwatch (an anti-capital punishment group). But when that colleague Constance Harraway dies, Gale is framed.

The Life of David Gale then has Bitsey Bloom who pledges to save Gale from execution. Slowly the investigation reveals that the victim herself records the tape of her murder. She commits suicide. She was willy-nilly going to die from cancer with which she was having a vain battle for a long. Bloom gets late to bring that precious video. Gale has already been executed. The climax shows Dusty Wright, the real culprit who framed Gale, also used to be the member of 'Deathwatch'. He was expelled from the group by Gale for being radical.

The Life of David Gale has acclaimed actors such as Kevin Spacey (David Gale), Kate Winslet (Bitsey Bloom), Laura Linney (Constance Harraway), Gabriel Mann (Zack Stemmons), Rhona Mitra (Berlin) and Leon Rippy as Braxton Belyeu. The film was extensively shot in Huntsville, Texas; Sam Houston State University; The University of Texas at Austin etc.

The Life of David Gale received two nominations. One was for the best director competing for the Golden Berlin Bear award 2003 and the other was the PFS Award 2004 in the category of the Human Rights.

The Life of David Gale has mostly been criticized for containing such controversial content. While few critics were there to assess its positive attributes like the impeccable performance of Spacey as David Gale or the enterprising presence of Kate Winslet or even the good intention of the storyline, most critics go for a bashing. One slammed the propaganda, while the other censured its 'ludicrous' treatment of a serious theme. The Life of David Gale