On October 6, 1970, after a stay in Istanbul, a U.S. citizen named Billy Hayes is arrested by Turkish police, on high alert due to fear of terrorist attacks, as he is about to fly out of the country with his girlfriend.
After being found with several bricks of hashish taped to his body – about two kilograms in total – he is sentenced to a relatively lenient four years and two months' imprisonment on the charge of drug possession. He is sent to Sağmalcılar prison to serve out his sentence.
In the remand centre, he meets and befriends other Western prisoners and quickly prepares an escape plan, which fails.
In 1974, after a prosecution appeal (who originally wished to have Hayes found guilty of smuggling and not possession), his original sentence is overturned by the Turkish High Court in Ankara, and he is ordered to serve a 30-year term for his crime.
His stay becomes a living hell: terrifying and unbearable scenes of physical and mental torture follow one another, where bribery, violence and insanity rule the prison. Monstrous wardens cruelly force the prisoners to undergo the worst brutalities. Some prisoners work for the prison administration as 'informers'.
In a fit of madness, Billy bites off the tongue of a prison informant who has notified the warden of his escape plan and also accused one of Billy's accomplices.
In 1975, after being committed to the prison's insane asylum, Billy again tries to escape, this time by attempting to bribe the warden-in-chief.
He ends up accidentally killing the warden, as the latter wanted to rape him, and Billy puts on an officer's uniform and manages his escape by walking out of the front door.
From the epilogue, it is explained that on the night of October 4, 1975 he successfully crossed the border to Greece, and arrived home three weeks later.
1 comment:
Yes, that film has always moved me as well. Just now, reading your synopsis, I got goosebumps.
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