Midnight Express
Tags: cruelty, murder, bleak, violence, cult, philosophical, romantic, claustrophobic, revenge, sadist

Plot synopsis:
This movie is based loosely on Billy Hayes' book Midnight Express about his five year experience in the Turkish prison system. The movie was exaggerated for dramatic effect.October 6, 1970. Opening scene has a xenophobic soundtrack of machine guns, Muslim prayer cries, and synthesizer music and a glimpse of Istanbul, Turkey during twilight with shots of the Bosphorus Strait, a mosque, and the downtown area with seagulls flying about . It is portrayed as a very spooky, forbidding place.While finishing up on his vacation in Istanbul, Turkey, American college student Billy Hayes (Brad Davis) is in his hotel room and straps several pounds of hashish (about two kilograms) to his body. The film's soundtrack consists of an increasing heartbeat.Billy is at the airport, nervous at being caught smuggling, goes to the washroom to wet his face and attempt to relax himself, and makes his way with his girlfriend, Susan (Irene Miracle), through customs. Billy perspires heavily, noticed by the middle aged, chain-smoking customs agent who checks his bag. After his bags are searched, both Billy and Susan board a shuttle bus to their plane. Billy smiles and is relieved thinking he is out of danger. However, as the bus pulls up to the plane, he notices that a large detachment of armed police and soldiers have taken up positions just outside the plane. Unable to detach and discard the hashish, and sweating heavily, Billy is arrested on the spot when he is frisked by a young Turkish policeman. Billy is taken away and back to security and searched, his bags being thoroughly searched and all items such as cigarettes, camera film, and toothpaste are searched and destroyed. He is forced to stand around in his underwear. Afterwards, the Turkish security chief of the airport makes his stand for several press photographs of him holding the confiscated drugs with the smiling customs officers and then slaps them around after Billy reveals more hashish in his boots they didn't find.A little later, Billy is forced to stand naked with the customs officers staring and grinning at him and an unidentified southern American man (Bo Hopkins), presumably an agent with the DEA, walks in. He is calm and kind with Billy and takes him to a local police station where he is is interrogated where Tex translates for a local Turkish detective whom offers Billy freedom if he points out who sold him the hash.He takes Billy downtown the next morning to the bazaar where he claims to have purchased the hashish and tells Billy that the recent terrorist airline hijackings have made the Turks much more fanatical about airport security and that the potency or type of drug that Billy was caught with doesn't matter: the Turkish government wants to appear tough on smuggling. Billy is at the restaurant that seems to be a popular place with young American hippies, where the sale happened and tries to run from his security escort. He is quickly caught by Tex himself, whose previously friendly attitude suddenly changes for the worse as he his holding a gun to his head.During his first night in holding, Billy has his hair cut short, put into a filthy cell by a trustee (Paolo Bonacelli) that refuses to give him a blanket for warmth because he's not selling at the time, then sneaks out of his tiny cell and takes a blanket in storage. He is later rousted out of his cell by the trustee and taken to a large guard resembling a picasso bull named Hamidou (Paul L. Smith, who later played Bluto in Popeye), the chief of guards, who takes him to another filthy room, the basement, trusses Billy's ankles in the air and hits the soles of his feet repeatedly with his club for stealing the blanket as well as hitting a trustee. Billy's feet swell immensely and he is left in horrific pain.However the next morning, a small group of prisoners, Jimmy (Randy Quaid), a towering, dumb, and hot-tempered American, and Erich, a kindly Swede, get him on his feet and walking (they tell him his feet will continue to swell and his recovery will be longer if he doesn't move around). Jimmy was sentenced for attempting to rob a mosque and Erich was busted for smuggling about 100 grams of hash and given a 12-year sentence. Jimmy is quite sure Billy will receive a stiff sentence, but Erich remains optimistic that he just needs a good lawyer and to talk to the Englishman Max for a lawyer. Jimmy shows Billy around how to navigate the minefield of the prison and not to trust any of the Turks, being a foreigner. The prison resembles an old barracks from the 1800's.Billy is introduced to Max (John Hurt), is a bespectacled, introverted, unkempt, 30-something junkie uninterested in small talk that injects himself with "gastro" a stomach medicine with codeine and has been in prison the longest for drug dealing (seven years and counting), while Erich has already served four years and Jimmy around three. Billy and Erich are conversing with him to get a lawyer and Max is in a haze telling Billy about the Turkish justice system and that all Turkish lawyers are crooked and that he just needs to escape the best way he knows how, to catch the "Midnight Express", a train that doesn't stop at the prison. He refers to him a lawyer named Yesil that got off a Frenchman for smuggling 200 kilos.A few weeks later, Billy's father (Mike Kellin) arrives and embraces him forgiving his mistake and introduces him to Stanley Daniels (Michael Ensign) of the American Consulate and his requested lawyer Yesil to defend him. Yesil is a fat, shifty, greasy-haired, chain-smoking, ever smiling man with gold teeth that promises Billy to get him the right court and judge and not to worry. Their goal is to get bail for Billy and a fake passport to get him across to Greece to leave.Billy appears before a local Turkish court before a panel of three judges to hear his case and defend him. But Billy's shifty and uninterested lawyer does little to combat the charges brought by an angry prosecutor, who wants Billy charged with more than possession: If Billy is charged with smuggling over mere possession, his sentence will be heavier. After the three judges deliberate for an uncertain amount of time, Billy is sentenced to serve a prison term of four years and two months for possession of hashish at the Sagmalcilar Prison. Billy and his father appear devastated while his defense lawyer argues that it is a good thing because the judges (sympathetic to Billy) turned down the prosecutor's request to convict Billy for smuggling or impose a life sentence in order to make an example of him. Billy's father gives him a care package of snacks, cigarettes, writing paper, toiletries, and loses his temper that he's unable to get him out of prison. He warns Billy not to do anything stupid and that they can play with his sentence. They tearfully depart.Over the next several months, Billy slowly adjusts to prison life. Jimmy gets stabbed in the behind for treating a Turkish prisoner badly and Hamidou beats several of the young boys on their soles believing to have raped a new young inmate, with his two pudgy sons looking on and him warning them about what happens if they break the law. He is also told about another prisoner named Rifki, the trustee, who informs on other prisoners for unheard-of privileges and favors and has a special distaste for foreigners. Rifki also sells watery tea, low-grade hashish, steals from his fellow inmates, and seems to have an unlimited (for incarceration) supply of money to bribe the poorly paid guards. When Max offends Rifki, the informant kills Max's pet cat.In June of 1972, Billy meets with his lawyer Yesil again with Yesil assuring him of convincing Turkish officials to lose his records before the high court in Ankara can review his case for the right amount of money. Billy is bored and uninterested at Yesil's visit feeling it's all empty promises.Jimmy shows Billy and Max blueprints to the prison of catacombs underneath to escape by scraping the mortar off and go underneath or simply climbing over the wall. Max dismisses Jimmy's idea as foolish and Billy does not want to risk trying to escape fearing that if he's caught it will add years to his sentence. An angry Jimmy decides to go ahead with it himself, being caught and badly beaten with a leather strap by Hamidou and sent to the sanitarium.In June of 1974, Billy's friend, Erich, is granted transfer to prison in his home country, more than likely leaving there after a short term because of Sweden's lenient laws, and leaves the prison after serving around eight years. Billy farewells with him and marks down his prison time to 53 days.After almost four years in the prison, Billy is informed that his case will be reviewed again. Thinking he's being let go early for good behavior, Billy rushes to meet with Stanley Daniels, the representative from the US ambassador's office in the Turkish capital city of Ankara. However, the representative has bad news; the High Court in the Turkish capital of Ankara has heard a different argument from the prosecutor who has appealed the four-year term verdict, and is seeking to charge Billy with smuggling hashish and make an example of him. The so-called double-jeopardy law of U.S. justice does not exist in Turkey. Any accused can be tried more then once for the same crime on appeal or should new evidence surface.At another courtroom hearing, a distraught Billy rails against the three judges, the prosecutor, his own lawyer, the Turkish legal system, and the nation of Turkey itself. Speaking through a translator, with a mixture of anger and pity in his voice, the chief judge tells Billy that his hands are tied by Ankara and has no choice but to give him a life sentence. Billy is given a minimum sentence of 30 years, with time already served, for smuggling of hashish.A saddened Billy sits in his cell with a sense of hopelessness that night, but now wants to go forward with Jimmy's original plan of escape. The stones used as walls in their section's kitchen are cemented in place with mortar that has weakened greatly in the dank conditions. Jimmy, Billy and Max discover two such stones and are able to remove them, finding a shaft behind them that leads to a system of flooded catacombs under the prison. The three of them spend two nights and hours searching for an escape route and seem to have found it once they remove a stone that has been saturated with water for decades. However, once they do go underneath, it turns out the Turks have long since blocked off every tunnel. The three give up and replace the stones.Rifki finds their secret in the kitchen the next morning after their unsuccessful escape attempt and immediately tells Hamidou. Hamidou suspects Jimmy of being responsible after what happened the first time and drags him off for punishment once again.Billy and Max figure out a revenge scheme: they find Rifki's stash of hidden money and destroy it by burning part and boiling the other part. In retaliation, a raid is performed by Hamidou and Rifki plays a charade with Hamidou and frames Max for hashish possession. Hamidou has Max dragged off for punishment like Jimmy was. Billy loses it after all he's been through and savagely attacks Rifki in the washroom, chasing and beating the traitor until he bites out the man's tongue out. Billy has snapped to this point and taken away by guards, beaten, and sent to the prison's insane asylum.In October 1975, Billy has now been reduced to a catatonic and unkempt mess of a man in prison's ward for the insane where he wanders in a daze among the other disturbed and catatonic prisoners, many of which look retarded. Max is running from guards for an unknown infraction and is grabbed by Hamidou and thrown across the place being severely injured. His activities seem to consist solely of walking in a circle around a pillar with other prisoners. One day a prisoner, named Ahmet, a convicted child rapist and college-educated philosopher tries to talk to him about "bad machines" to no avail.A group of men are doing their morning Muslim prayers and the guards hit the inmates with their sticks waking them up out of bed. Billy is hit, howls out of sleep, and horrified, making it evident he is suffering badly from PTSD.After 5 years, Billy is visited by Susan, who tells him that senator's are trying to work on his case to get him out, pleads with him to put himself together and get out of there unless he wants to die, and passes him a photo album of his family and tells him it has a picture of his "good friend, Mr. Franklin, from the bank". Susan, feeling devastated at Billy's horribly bedraggled state, also opens her blouse so Billy can masturbate. A guard takes him away with Susan even more devastated.The next morning, Billy is walking the pillar in the opposite direction, which is forbidden in the Muslim code. Ahmet meets him telling him it's wrong that a good Muslim always walks right. His words seem restore some of Billy's sanity and Billy tells him that he himself is the man that makes the machines. Ahmet walks away horrified.Billy goes into the filthy sanatorium washroom and inspects the album closely, finding numerous $100 bills hidden inside totaling around $2,000 in cash. He passes by an almost dead Max to hold on and stay alive that he's leaving and will come back for him. Max wakes up and is somewhat conscious.Billy sees Hamidou taking a restraining belt off a now dead inmate and about to leave. He approaches Hamidou with part of the money and tries to bribe his longtime enemy to take him to the sanatorium that Jimmy had spoken about where the guards are more lax in their duties. Hamidou accepts Billy's bribe to take him there, but instead takes him elsewhere. He's drags Billy to a large dressing room filled with guard uniforms and with pegs set into the walls. Hamidou beats Billy, chats with him about how he's fed up with him, and attempts to rape him when Billy suddenly rushes to Hamidou and pushes him forcefully backwards. Hamidou, flailing and trying to regain his footing, slams into the wall, driving a clothes peg into the back of his head, dying instantly. For a short time, Billy considers shooting the dead man with his sidearm but decides not to.Billy dresses himself in a guard's uniform and reclaiming his money, walks through the prison unnoticed to the front door. As he walks down the stairs, another guard stops him and throws him the keys to the door telling him (in Turkish) to remember to lock up when he checks out. Billy walks out to the street, slowing down only briefly when a police jeep rushes past him. He runs away, the frame freezing on him as he takes a victorious leap. A title card tells us that on the night of October 4, 1975, Billy was able to cross the Turkish border into Greece and flew home to the United States three weeks later. The final shots of the film before the closing credits show Billy reuniting with his family and Susan. In the original version, it was stated after having shown the movie to the Cannes film festival, there was a demand for exchange of prisoners in Turkey to be brought to America.

Review: I've read an interview and I learnt that the real Billy Hayes was truly disappointed with the portrayal of Turkish people in the film.
However, as a person who has spent time in Turkey and read the book upon which the film is based, I know that it is a fictional story.
It begins with a caption "a true story" but the only thing true about this movie is that someone named Billy Hayes was caught trying to smuggle a lot of hashish out of the country and was sent to jail.
This is one movie that infuriates the Turkish government whenever it is shown and I believe rightly so because it caters to the notion that Turkey is some type or barbaric nation with a population that is incapable of human emotion or decency.
The first was Billy Hayes himself, when he first arrived on native soil, having pulled off his alleged escape; he said on TV, "I like the Turks...it's the prison I had a problem with" Easy to understand; few prisons are a joy ride, regardless of nation of origin.
The exterior scenes in Turkey itself have a grayish tint, implying the land is a hell-hole, and even the near-universally acclaimed cuisine gets a black eye.The second thing from the (film's release) period I recall was a discussion on radio that claimed the prison Billy served time in was relatively modern, built in the mid-sixties...
(A 19th-Century British barracks in Malta was used for the prison.) Naturally, some artistic leeway is allowed here, since the movie's purpose is to paint a picture of a living nightmare.I recall reading the book years ago, and when our hero got his unfair sentence, naturally he was in despair...
But, given the politics of our time, if the author of the screenplay wanted to create a demon people for dramatic effect, perhaps it would have been better to have set the story in a fictional or unidentified country.
While this film is entertaining to watch and has its level of suspense at various points it is not a truly `true story'  much of it according to the real Billy Hayes never happened and his eventual escape is very different from what is depicted in this motion picture.
In an interview in 1984 producer David Puttnam admitted that the film is based on a "dishonest book".Billy Hayes reveals himself 20 years after his release, that what is presented in the movie is a very exaggerated and fictional version of what happened to him in the prison in Istanbul, Turkey.Finally, after 25 years, Oliver Stone has apologized to Turkey for this film in 2004 when he visited Turkey.
See this (an The Last Detail) if you are a Randy fan.There is a completely unnecessary and inane scene in which the lead character delivers a speech in a Turkish court - cut this scene short and you have a perfect movie.Midnight Express is controversial and though-provoking.
*The following is not a spoiler from the movie but points out an event from the plot* In reality, William Hayes it turns out, was arrested at the Turkish airport for trying to smuggle packs of drugs attached on his body into the U.S., and he was held for a time before being given to the American authorities for deportation.
William Hayes and Oliver Stone themselves it turns out, have already apologized to the Turkish people for the overly dramatized and fictional parts of the movie and the book.
People who are anti-Turkish love praising this movie and insisting that it's a true story all the way while the Turks keep getting rightfully offended.
Even just logic would tell you that at a time where the U.S. and Turkey had such strong relations during the cold war, something like what is shown in the movie would have been unthinkable by the Turkish authorities.
It tells of American Hayes' (Brad Davis) arrest and subsequent conviction for trying to smuggle hashish out of Istanbul, Turkey, for which he was sent to a hellish Turkish prison to serve his time.
I wish they'd shown some of the milk of human kindness I (also) witnessed." By the way it is not just a movie, since its release, the film has been seen all over the world...continuing to work as a campaign regarding the evil image of the Turks..
Life in a Turkish prison might not be anywhere close to a vacation in Hawaii, but the situation is exaggerated 5 million times in this movie.
For those who don't know: There was another American guy who went to prison in Turkey at about the same time as Hayes, for the same crime.
And upon watching this revolting movie, he wrote a book about his experience in the "tourist cell" of a Turkish prison, and he clearly states Hayes is a big time BS thrower and his life in the Turkish prison was exactly as good as a life in any prison could have been.
People might say, that it is just entertainment, but this movie comes up with the ambition to show the world, how brutally corruption in mid-east countries exist.The problem of the whole storytelling is the one-sided point of view.
The problem that I have with this character is that we are never told his name, or why he is even there, but he is certainly a key element in the film, since he is the one who put Billy behind bars after a stupid attempt to escape.Now, I do agree on the fact that the punishment must fit the crime, and at the beginning, the 4-year sentence that Billy's given seems to be just about right for a federal offense such as trying to smuggle drugs from one country to another, but our "hero" never seems to be able to understand the severity of his crime, and never seems to regret his actions, even coming close to demanding that his father "get him out of there".
After his sentence is changed to Life in Prison, Billy goes berserk, and starts a monologue against Turkish justice, and even its people that must have caused quite a controversy back in its day.The supporting characters are all brilliantly played, namely John Hurt in an Oscar-nominated turn as an English prisoner who has been half eaten by drugs and prison life, and who is left behind by Billy at the end, but we never are told what became of him.
Randy Quaid is equally good, albeit, in a more thankless role as a fellow American who was imprisoned for 7 years after stealing a candlestick from a temple.The movie is not easy to digest, but is realistic enough to make you feel for the leading characters, especially Billy, even though we know that he deserved to do the time, we don't feel like he deserved Life Sentence, and so, that is why the ending is so rewarding in our hearts.
This excellent movie deals with the American Bill Hayes (performedd by the late Brad Davis ) who was detained smuggling two kilograms of hashish while trying to board the flight along with his girlfriend (Irene Miracle) from Istanbul, Turkey, in 1970 .
I have been living in Turkey since I was born that is I am living in my own country for 21 years and I have never seen such bad people or such bad behaviour towards people like in this stupid movie.
It is generally believed that "Midnight Express" is one of those rare films which must have had a long life of maximum television reruns in USA thanks to its disputatious content.Those who have seen it will have no qualms in affirming that even after 30 years of its release, Midnight Express continues to offend Turkish people as it had portrayed their nation as a barbaric third world country which has scant respect for human rights.All the fuss is created due to the shocking yet sympathetic portrayal of an American citizen William Hayes who is put in a Turkish prison after his arrest on drug peddling charges.It is true that director Alan Parker and script writer Oliver Stone have done a good job by showing that some prisons can turn out to be absolute hell.What did not work in their favor is the fact that most of scenes related to prison life and William Haye's treatment by Turkish authorities have been grossly exaggerated.
To state that British director Alan Parker's film Midnight Express is a highly controversial work of art would be akin to twisting history.It is a film entirely based on perceptions.One must watch "Le Trou" by Jacques Becker if somebody is looking for a commendable film based on prison life..
Not only are the events at least somewhat fictionalized in a way that makes the Turks look worse, but every element of this film is bursting with what seems like simple disgust and hatred for Turks and Turkey without any foundation.
No culture in the world, now or ever, is even remotely as bad as the Turks are shown here, and I can't think of another film I have ever seen that makes any other nation, ethnic, or political group (not even Nazi-era Germans) look so demonic.
"Midnight Express" is the upsetting true story of an American youth detained at Istanbul Airport trying to smuggle several packets of hashish This terrific movie based on Hayes' book details the terrible story of his severe experience and final escapeBrad Davis puts on view the frustration, anxiety and severe mental suffering of a tragic figure...
There is no doubt Turkey was shown barbaric; in this movie, Turkish people characterised as foolish and cruel.
Actually both Alan Parker and Oliver Stone agreed that the movie criticised Turkish people unfairly.
You can go and check on Youtube and one gave one link below...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TweU77cDrgEThis interview reveals the truth behind the story of the movie "Midnight Express".
Movie is based on a real life event, but the story is far from being accurate.It also happens in some gangster movies, you can feel pity for a guy who is actually doing things wrong, like Godfather, or like the protagonist of Midnight Express, who is a drug smuggler, who is caught by the Turkish authorities while intentionally carrying a great deal of illegal substance.Now, please show some emphaty, imagine an alien guy from a country that you don't like, say Turkey, coming to your country and committing a crime which requires punishment with prison.
He, and his screen writer take the main idea of the book and change it to give us a horror story, and in the process, he makes the fatal mistake in thinking that by giving the viewer a glance about what Billy has to endure in prison doesn't fit the crime he committed.Mr. Parker and his main collaborator, Oliver Stone, have created a film that has the tone of a documentary; the emphasis is on the cruelty experienced in prison.
Actually, the director and the screen play, place the blame in the Turkish prison system, but actually, they succeed in making a hero of this idiotic man.Hayes was a coward and an opportunist who believed he would be able to get away with his crime without being made accountable for it, as he would get a profit from the sale of the drug.
The prisoners can get food from outside, pay their way for basic necessities; it was almost like living in a flea bag hotel in a foreign country.Brad Davis makes a puzzling Billy.
And the fact that is not as famous as the movie is that in 1981, Oliver Stone and Billy Hayes himself gave a press conference in which they have said that they have exaggerated the story.
Special mention to William Hurt in his co-protagonist rol where he leads every time he talks as the dying Max. The Midnight Express passed in 1978 and has left a mark on my life and on everyone who has seen this masterpiece film..
But, every time I told someone I was going on vacation in Istanbul they would ask, "Didn't you see Midnight Express?" "Yeah, it was a bad movie." Sad!.
Oliver Stone deserves some credit here too, since he wrote the script, and successfully characterizes Billy's smuggling as the foolish mistake of a callow young man rather than the plot of an evil mastermind.The film challenges its viewers to care about some unappealing people, and to watch them persevere through some harrowing experiences.
There's nothing about Turkey and Turkish people in this movie.
You can listen to his version of the story where Turks are just like any other people and their "turkish prison" is about as bad as any other prison in the world....
I feel sorry for Turkish people for the way they are depicted in this film and I want them to know not everyone is small minded enough to base their judgement on you solely based on this ridiculous film.Even if this movie was based entirely on fact I still wouldn't feel sorry for the guy who tried to smuggle drugs out of a country with no regards for the lives he would ruin..
I've never been to Turkey, or Istanbul, and I can hold no claims as to what it must be like for a person, American or otherwise, to endure time in one of their country's prisons.
The story of William Hayes is ugly, as depicted in the film, and despite the fact that the real Hayes has said the depiction of some of the characters in the film is not as it was, it does not deter it for myself in the pure emotional intake.The story at first does not sound like it will have a happy outcome- Hayes (Davis, a shattering, torn performance) tries to smuggle Hash for friends back on long island, gets caught, and is thrown in jail 'as an example' among others in a Turkish prison.
What occurs from there is what makes up the bulk of the drama, the hurt, and a 'version' of the truth in the Turskish prison system.The thing to keep in mind in dealing with a film like Midnight Express, is that in cinematic terms, Parker and Stone pull off their goals whether or not they depict the 'truth' to its fullest extent.
There are many known occasions around the world (and in USA) where people pass years in prisons for the crimes they have not committed.In the movie, things about Turkey are totaly fictitious.
Midnight Express is one of Alan Parker's greatest cinematic achievements and it talks about the ruthless prison environment in Turkey as well as the corrupt and ineffective Turkish criminal system.
Im a turkish boy and im proud of being a turk.that movie may be a good movie but its full of exaggerations.Even Billy Hayes admitted that that movie was full of exegerations.Some ppl have some prejudieces about turkey and turkish people.and i don't like that.For ex i watched the movie called 'sleepers' but i dont think that all Americans rape kids in jail..
I know it was not pleasant being in a Turkish prison in the 70's, probably there were a few bad guards, but showing all the Turks in the movie like animals, No, that is pure racism!!Another awful fact in the movie is how the Judge speak Turkish!!
Film details his time spent in prison paying off his debt to Turkish society.What is with Alan Parker?
They talk to Turkish people , they eat Turkish food, as Hayes did and they pay a lot for the experience they lived.I hope one day Mr. Oliver Stone and Alan Parker would make a movie of Abu Gureyb prison in Iraq.I am looking forward to watching that movie.But this time please make sure that it is really a TRUE story..
Turks were furious when the 1978 film depicted their prisons as cruel, barbaric establishments by featuring scenes of rape and torture in movie.Turkey is a secular and democratic country.
Loosely based on the true story of Billy Hayes (collected from his book of the same title), Alan Parker's "Midnight Express" contains some of the most effective and rightly iconic scenes in all of film history -- the opening with the heartbeats devoid of any soundtrack; the "Oh Billy!" segment; and of course the entire idea of Turkish prisons being terrible and abusive.Hayes' story was elaborative to begin with and Oliver Stone -- not exactly one to be known for sticking close to the truth -- exaggerates it even more; so far, indeed, that it almost becomes fictional.
I LIKE it and i simply know what other people think about this movie.
This film is based on the true story of Billy Hayes, a young American student sent to a Turkish prison for trying to smuggle hashish out of Turkey.There because of America's relationship with Turkey at that time, Billy's sentence changes from 4 years to 30 years.Billy has no option but to escape any way he can.This 1978 film won two Oscars Best Music, Original Score (Giorgio Moroder) and Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium (Oliver Stone).The casting is superb.
Anyway, the atmosphere of the movie is gloomy and depressing, but Billy Hayes and his friends in prison had a good performance.
Good reason to deter people from doing what Billy Hayes did.Midnight Express is probably the best of a tradition of Americans in foreign prisons films like Breakout or Brokedown Palace as other examples.
Each of them adapts to Turkish prison in their own way and they all mentor Davis.The real Billy Hayes said that the portrayal of the Turks was unjust and that we shouldn't judge Turkey by the Turks we see here.
This movie is all about "drug smuggling", not about Turkey or Turkish people.
After trying to smuggle Drugs from Turkey into America, Billy Hayes is sentenced to over 30 years in prison for only smuggling a very small amount of it in.For a true story i actually quite liked it.