Billy Bob Thornton is a sort of Renaissance man in cinema. Not only he is an acclaimed actor, he is also an Oscar-winning writer, a director, a musician and a TV host. In fact, it is quite hard to find an artist with so many sets of caliber for today's standard. Thornton's most personal and memorable work is 'Sling Blade', who propelled him to international stardom and the best example of his power in acting, writing and directing a film!
'Sling Blade' is THE Billy Bob Thornton film. Not only he acted, wrote and directed this 1996 gem, the film itself was based on a mini-play in a TV show by Thornton a few years before that. In that mini-play, which featured him and also Molly Ringwald, who famously played the role of the princess – Claire - from 'The Breakfast Club', concerned the fictional character Karl Childers, who was mentally disturbed from a young age. He was institutionalized in a mental hospital since 12, because he killed his mother and her lover with a kaiser blade (or, somebody calls it a sling blade). The play chronicled an interview from a journalist (Ringwald's character) to the adult Childers before he was released from an asylum after some psychiatric evaluation. For 'Sling Blade' itself, it concerned what happened after Childers was released into the community, and the 'interview' itself was featured in the first couple of minutes in the film.
Hence Childers was released back into a small town in Arkansas. Through clinically he might have some mental issues, he had hands-on skills of repairing machines, so he eventually found his place in the town as a repairman in a small shop. While Karl appeared to be a simple-minded person, he was willing to connect and interact with others despite of some difficulties in speech due to his cognitive impairments. He had a kind heart and befriended Frank, a child who had a close relationship with his widowed mother Linda. Both Frank and Linda were victimized by Doyle, Linda's abusive boyfriend. Luckily, they all found solace in Vaughan, who was also under-privileged due to his sexual orientation. Karl was able to build up a positive relationship with Frank, acting as a surrogate father for him. Yet there was still a dragon to slay : Doyle has announced that he wished to marry Linda, and his increasingly aggressive control over Frank and Linda has worried everyone. No matter how one hopes for a simpler world, it is always complicated with evils from within. Karl knew that he had to take action to protect Frank – just what would he do?
It is informative to know the context of 'Sling Blade' with regards to other films when it came out in 1996. Many viewers observed obvious similarities to 'Forrest Gump' of 1994, and stated that the Billy Bob Thornton film was a grittier and more realistic film about mental illness. One should note that 'Sling Blade' was a small-scale production, more inclined as an independent film, so Thornton was willing to go for a more contentious style in the film, focusing on the more debatable dilemmas that patients of mental illness would likely to face in the real world. 'Forrest Gump', while an excellent film, is more of a crowd-pleaser, and I feel that it resembles more like a fairy tale than a film grounded in realism (which it attempts hard to convince the audience). It is about a simple man who was just extremely lucky to drop into every iconic historical moments possible, and if 'Forrest Gump' is a box of chocolate, that is the one from Willy Wonka's factory, loaded with sugar and only for kids. 'Sling Blade' is a box of dark chocolate (which is my favorite), which you can carefully appreciate rough its subtle bitterness. When one knows how to appreciate chocolate, they know which one to go after.
It is of some coincidence that 'Sling Blade' also shared some similarities with two other Oscar-nominated films from 1996. 'Sling Blade' had a brilliant male performance like Geoffrey Rush's 'Shine', in which Rush won the Best Actor Oscar. Both films portrayed an underdog protagonist who had to blend in to their environment, and confronted their shady past. It is even more curious to note for subtle parallels in 'Sling Blade' and Lars von Trier's 'Breaking the Waves', with Emily Watson's mind-blowing performance. Her character, who was simple-minded and intoxicated with a strong sense of faith, was like a female version of Karl Childers. The parallels were even further than that : Bess (Emily Watson in 'Breaking the Waves') and Childers were both fighting against the prejudice in their respective communities, and their eventual martyrdom. While I believed the motivation could be unintentional, Thornton's 'Sling Blade' has suggested a moral and religious outlook for us to contemplate, as Karl's actions often reflected the discrepancies between justice and legality.
Thornton has put much efforts into 'Sling Blade', and made it a beautiful and memorable film that seldom appeared in the escapist era of cinema. Thornton's portrayal of Karl was first-rate. He went into the details of patients who suffered from mental illness, with accurate speech patterns and subtle gestures and movements, and the nature of their illness – such as an impaired ability to understand things beyond a literal level. Thornton took an old-school approach to develop his character – through the film he exposed to us the background and circumstances that led to his illness and institutionalization at such a young age. Also, Thornton wisely avoided a over-sentimental narrative. In the film we did not see an overtly dramatic scenario where everyone was against Karl (to make him appear vulnerable), instead we witnessed a supportive community, with many simple and kind-hearted people who was willing to help. All these aspects make 'Sling Blade' a more realistic film and easier for the audience to identify with.
Viewers can feel empathetic to Karl because of the circumstances he was forced to endure when he was merely a child. First, he did not receive good parenting. He was forced to commit immoral acts requested from his irresponsible father – to dispose an unwanted infant. It was outrageous because the adult shifted the responsibility of a moral transgression to a child, and the child simply was not mature enough to analyze the implications of the action. With an impaired mentality, Karl murdered his mother and his lover because his lover was attempting to rape her. While on a legal point-of-view there was no way to justify a murder, the irony of Karl's action showed that he appreciated the moral implications of the action. He knew that it was wrong for the lover to do such a nasty thing this mother, and he felt disillusioned and disgusted by his mother's moral degradation, because she willingly allowed herself to be sexually assaulted. The murder was Karl's response of reprimanding the situation – he just chose the legally unacceptable way to do so when he attempted to achieve a sense of justice. After all, is Karl really that bad? He was willing to socialize with others (even when he might appear slow due to his impairment), and he certainly had a sense of empathy and care to his friends. He was on track with his rehabilitation in the environment and his skills for repair-work has led to acceptance and respect in his community. We can even go further and state his mental issues did not necessarily prevent him from being a noble and moral individual. Karl has sorted out the issues from his past and appreciated it was wrong to kill someone under the law, and he could make sense of his problems through the circumstances of his childhood. Karl was also intelligent enough to see the warning signals from the relationships between Frank and Doyle. He mapped out the same trajectory that has happened to his own childhood. He knew that he was committed to help Frank to avoid disaster, and he was so single-minded that he was ready to give up anything to achieve that.
The climax of 'Sling Blade' was memorable and had an afterlife on the internet, as noted from the enthusiastic approvals of millions of viewers. That scene, who chronicled Karl's murder of Doyle, is a 'killer moment' for me, to put it in Mr. Tarantino's words. This well-executed sequence was a dead-pan and tragic scene, yet it also possessed a darkly humorous tone that it provided catharsis for the audience. Karl sharpened a lawnmower blade and went to confront Doyle. Doyle, drunken as always, did not appreciate the imminent threat. Karl bluntly announced his intention to kill Doyle with the blade, and asked Doyle for advice on what to do after Doyle was dead (!!). Thinking Karl was just trolling around, Doyle taught him to call 911 and even suggested him to 'get an ambulance or a hearse'. His advice was met with a few heavy blows from Karl's blade, and then Doyle was a dead man. Fully understanding the consequence of his actions, he called the police to turn himself in, and consumed a 'last supper' of biscuits with mustard before his arrest. The sequence suggested that Karl has clearly contemplated and weighted on the issues. While he knew that it was illegal to kill anyone, he has determined that only by eliminating Doyle could he save Frank from a fate like his. He was totally conscious that he might face severe punishment for the murder, yet he decided to sacrificehe his freedom to liberate an innocent child. To put it in a more symbolic perspective, Karl's action was a personal redemption for being an accomplice of his own father's crime of killing the infant. His murder of Doyle signified that he has destroyed the evil that his father and Doyle represented. Willing to face punishment for his crime, Karl has demonstrated a sense of legal obligation and he became a martyr for his own values. It was fortunate to note that after the trial, Karl was again institutionalized rather than receiving more severe punishment, and he has clearly shown a more positive outlook and a peace of mind in seclusion.
'Sling Blade' is certainly a small film with a big heart!
by Ed Law
Film Analysis
