MONSTER'S BALL

Year: 2001
USA: Lions Gate Films
UK: Entertainment Film Distributors
Cast: Billy Bob Thornton, Halle Berry, Heath Ledger, Peter Boyle, Sean 'Puffy' Combs, Coronji Calhoun, Dante Beze, Anthony Marble, John McConnell, Mark Swanson
Director: Marc Forster
Country: USA
USA: 108 mins
UK: 111 mins
USA Rated: R for strong sexual content, language and violence
UK Certificate: 15 contains some strong language and sex
USA Release Date: 8 February 2002
USA Release Date: 26 December 2001 (Limited Release - Los Angeles and New York)
UK Release Date: 7 June 2002

Synopsis

MONSTER'S BALL is a hard hitting Southern drama tempered by a story of powerful, life-changing love. It is the story of Hank Grotowski (Billy Bob Thornton), an embittered prison guard working on Death Row who begins an unlikely, but emotionally charged affair with Leticia Musgrove (Halle Berry), the wife of a man he has just executed. MONSTER'S BALL also features Heath Ledger and Peter Boyle. Boyle plays Hank's bigoted, aging father, Buck, whose hatred seems to have poisoned his entire family as much as the family business, which is working on the prison Death Squad. Ledger plays Hank's son, Sonny, who is hell-bent on getting out of the family business.

The film is directed by award-winning filmmaker Marc Forster. He was nominated for an IFP/West Spirit Award as Best Low Budget Feature and won the Movado "Someone to Watch" Prize at the 2001 Spirit Awards for his film, EVERYTHING PUT TOGETHER.

Set in Georgia, MONSTER'S BALL was filmed entirely on location in and around New Orleans, Louisiana and at the notorious Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola (also known as "The Farm").