The many faces of Sean Penn

“Dead Man Walking” (1995)

Penn the Condemned Man: Matthew Poncelet (Penn) is already on the brink of death when we meet him—sentenced to the death penalty after he’s convicted of rape and murder. He reaches out to a nun (Susan Sarandon) who tries to help him come to grips with what he’s done, and prepare him for the day of reckoning to come. Balancing humanity with depravity, Penn portrays this tough convict as arrogant, ignorant, racist but also lonely and frightened, and earned his first Oscar nomination for the effort. Poncelet is a decidedly evil and flawed man, but still a man nonetheless. By film’s end, both the nun and the audience are left to question their beliefs and wonder if even the worst of men should be merely tossed away.