Billy Hayes is caught attempting to smuggle drugs out of a country. The courts decide to make an example of him, sentencing him to more than 30 years in prison. Hayes has two opportunities for release: the appeals made by his lawyer, his family, and the American government, or the "Midnight Express".
Acting
Brad Davis's physical deterioration is genuinely disturbing.
Direction
Parker turns every corridor into psychological torture.
Score
Giorgio Moroder's synths somehow make everything MORE anxious.
Director
Alan Parker
Brad Davis
Billy Hayes
Irene Miracle
Susan
Bo Hopkins
Tex
Paolo Bonacelli
Rifki
Paul L. Smith
Hamidou
Randy Quaid
Jimmy Booth
Norbert Weisser
Erich
John Hurt
Max
Mike Kellin
Mr. Hayes
Franco Diogene
Yesil
Michael Ensign
Stanley Daniels
Gigi Ballista
Chief Judge
Kevork Malikyan
Prosecutor
Peter Jeffrey
Ahmet
Joe Zammit Cordina
Airport Customs Officer
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Turkey's government formally protested the film, claiming it damaged tourism; Billy Hayes later admitted exaggerating certain brutalities in his memoir.
Oliver Stone won his first Oscar for this screenplay written during his own cocaine-fueled period, which he later called 'a young man's angry script.'
GB
US
