Dead Man Walking

After corresponding with death-row inmate Matthew Poncelet, Sister Helen Prejean agrees to visit him and eventually becomes his spiritual adviser. As the date of his execution approaches, she presses Matthew to confront the truth of his crime while also listening to the grief and anger carried by the victims’ families.

Adapted by Tim Robbins from Sister Helen Prejean’s eyewitness account, Dead Man Walking refuses to separate questions of mercy from the devastating harm at the center of the case. The drama invites audiences to hold accountability, compassion, punishment, and human dignity in tension without offering an easy answer.