Sling Blade

A southern gothic tale about a man named Karl (Thornton, Bad Santa), who's just been released from an asylum, 25 years after he committed a gruesome crime. He returns to the southern town of his youth, where his quiet, gentle manner and simple charm land him a job and lead him to an unlikely friendship with a young boy and his widowed mother. When the mother's abusive boyfriend appears, however, this simple man is thrust into a combustible dilemma that has powerful, moving consequences.