[1] The movie is about the final nine months of the life of Gary Gilmore, beginning with his release from prison at the age of 35 after serving 12 years for robbery in Indiana.
Gilmore next moves on to another job, at an insulation factory, where he performs well at first, but starts to have erratic hours and contentious relationships with co-workers.
While his attorneys, the ACLU and his family try to persuade Gilmore to pursue more appeals, he argues to have the sentence carried out and becomes a national media sensation.
[4] In what the New York Times described as a "searing performance," Tommy Lee Jones won an Emmy Award for his role in this work.
[3] Time Out- London said about the film's performances: "Jones (playing Gilmore) goes his own fascinating route to the loser's nirvana without recourse to psycho-style tics, while strong character performances from Arquette and Lahti constantly shift the focus back towards the everyday straitjacket of Utah underdogs.
They both advised viewers to seek out a version that was longer and released in European theatres, as it had restored a lot of material that was edited out when the film was shown on American TV in 1982.