Rating: 
Summary: Haunting, brilliant, terrifying, and heartbreaking
Review: This understated masterpiece features a former bit player named Billy Bob Thornton, who had knocked around show biz for a few years in films like "Chopper Chicks in Zombietown." But he had a story he was dying to tell. He managed to scrape together enough support to make a short version of this film in 1994, and it generated enough attention to be expanded into this full-length feature version.It's the story of a tremendously unfortunate person whose life fits the kind of horror stories you hear about child abuse. Raised in a shed separate from his family, who wanted nothing to do with him, Karl is neglected, picked on, and beaten for years, at home and at school. He ultimately commits a double murder, which he had thought was the right thing to do under the circumstances. The film opens on the day Karl is released from the institution where he has been treated for understandably serious mental problems, and there's not a cliche in the film from start to finish (unless you count the hard-drinking white trash bad guy). Thornton wrote, directed, and starred, and he bears no resemblance to the Thornton you may better recognize from films like "Primary Colors," "Armageddon," and "Bandits." This chameleon of an actor loses himself in Karl, and it's indescribably hypnotic to watch the story unfold and to see his character develop, a remarkably closed individual with no context to relate to any human being, who becomes an unlikely father figure to a lonely boy and is ultimately drawn toward an unavoidable ending. More good news is that in spite of its violent subject matter there is no blood or gore in this film. All the violence is implied and felt far more keenly by the viewer than any simple-minded splatter film. This is the story of multiple tragedies: A human life wasted, leading to the ending of other lives, and several dysfunctional families trying desperately to cope with the weirdness of life....and of Karl. John Ritter also earns respect for his performance as a gay man living in a small town, and Robert Duvall has an eerie cameo as Karl's nearly-forgotten father, himself descending into madness. The human tragedy, southern style, has rarely been portrayed with such pathos and authentic feel.
Rating:
Summary: I loved this movie!!
Review: I only had one problem with this movie. I understand that it was written and directed by Billy Bob Thornton and he did a great job except for the one major female part. I had trouble with Mrs. Wheatly, the young boy's mother, because I don't think her character was fleshed out enough. Why would she so easily allow her son to hang out with a man with obvious mental problems? I mean, I loved Karl but she didn't know anything about him other than her son liked him. A small point, I know, but I did wonder about it in an otherwise perfect movie.
Rating:
Summary: Heroes come in all shapes and sizes
Review: This movie is an excellent portrayal of good over evil. While there are a few moments that you have to question (like Miss Whitley being okay with her pre-teen son befriending a middle aged man with mental problems). The movie just seems bigger than life. You can't help but feel that God's vengence would be similar to Carl's actions. Billy Bob is deeper than you think.
Rating:
Summary: Great Story, Tremendous Acting By Billy Bob Thornton
Review: This movie won the Academy Award for best screenplay, and it's very easy to see why it was deserving of the acclaim that it received. The movie centers around Carl Childers (Billy Bob Thornton), a mentally retarded man who has just been released from a mental hospital after spending most of his life there. He's a convicted murderer who killed his own mother and her lover, but the audience is made to love him from the beginning and feel sympathy for his situation. He befriends a young boy named Frank who is being raised by a single mother who has an abusive boyfriend. The movie centers around the growing friendship between Carl and Frank, and how Carl decides to take matters into his own hands in order to protect Frank and his mother from the abusive boyfriend. The strength of this movie is in the acting job by Thornton. His character is a cross between Boo Radley from To Kill A Mockingbird (by Harper Lee) and Lenny from Of Mice And Men (by John Steinbeck). While the audience is suspicious of Carl at the beginning of the movie because of his history, we are quickly assured that he is extremely gentle and kind. Also of note is the performance by Dwight Yoakam as the abusive boyfriend. You'll really hate his character, which obviously means that Yoakam did a great acting job. Overall, this is an excellent movie. It's definitely worth seeing.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent
Review: In what is probably his crowning achievement, Billy Bob Thornton shines as writer, director, and star of this excellent film. His Karl Childers is one of the most memorable screen characters in recent film history, a mentally challenged child-man who seems to find it difficult to adapt to life outside the mental institution where he had been a resident since childhood. Karl is a simple man, yet possessing a complex personality. Capable of deep caring (particularly towards his young friend Frank), he is equally capable of deep rage, which manifests itself in a rather gruesome way (as evidenced by his final encounter with the despicable Doyle (played to perfection by country singer Dwight Yoakam). Thornton completely immerses himself in the characterization of Karl, evoking both sympathy and fear. The rest of the supporting cast is also superb, particularly John Ritter, who delivers a fine performance as a man beset by his own demons, but whose innate kindness is quickly perceived by Karl. This is an absorbing, disturbing film, and one which will not soon be forgotten by the viewer.
Rating:
Summary: An terrific wonderful film, which is unforgettable.
Review: When a man by his early forties living in a Mental Hostipal, who being release by the first time in thirty years by the name of Karl Childers (Billy Bob Thornton) for murdering her's mother lover and then his mother. Karl is a mentally challenge man, who never really experience the outside world. Once he's out to the World, Karl befriend with a sad-sensitive boy (Lucas Black), His Mother (Natalie Canerday) and a nice man (John Ritter), who take a liking in him. Karl hits reality with mean-spirited alcoholic abuser man (Dwight Yoakam) and his past comes to haunt him. Writted and Directed by Billy Bob Thornton (All the Pretty Horses, Daddy and Then), which is based on his Play, which also he win for an Oscar for Best Adatped Screenplay. Thornton was also nominated for Best Actor. This independent film has First-Rate Performances by all. J.T. Walsh, James Hampton and Brent Briscoe appears in Small Roles-including Oscar-Winner:Robert Duvall. This film is touching, sad and funny also. This is a real one of a kind, unique film. A true classic of the 90's-A Winner. Grade:A+.
Rating:
Summary: It is all in the interpretation
Review: Hearing a comedian making fun of the main character's voice, I wasn't sure if this movie was for me. I figure that if is fodder for comedy bits, then it can't be that good. I am glad I watched the movie anyway, because this is a fine film. The story concerns the release of a developmentally slow man who is released from a state hospital for killing someone when he was a child. We watch him try to understand the world around him with whatever ability he has. With the family of a widow, her son, the widow's brutal boyfriend, and gay friend, Karl (played by Thornton) struggles to understand what is right and how to make things right. Some call it a sling blade, and some call it a Kaiser blade; it is all a matter of interpretation. This film is filled with interpretations as people struggle to have their interpretation understood. The brutal boyfriend, convincingly played by Dwight Yoakam, pushes for what he thinks life should be. Karl tries to be a friend to the young boy, but learns the boy needs a good father. Everyone will try to make life into what they hope it would be. This is a very good film, and I would highly recommend seeing it.
Rating:
Summary: This is one of those films that tastes good!!
Review: Sling Blade is a simple story that focuses on a simple man. It is a beautiful film that focuses on realism as it's main weapon. As was the case with 'The Apsotle', Sling Blade takes every day people and places the camera on them. Of course, it doesn't merely stop there; we get to see one of the most powerful climaxes of the modern day movie age. This films involves a number of delicious elements. We see friendship between the oddest of people:...It's a life that is simple, involving loyalty, love, understanding for one another, and the urgency to protect those who can't defend themselves. Even John Ritter's ...character is seen as a man destined for heaven, despite Karl's knowledge of what the Bible says ... This film is raw and moves along without apologies for the simple fan of the "spell everything out for me movies" genre. Sling Blade is a classic and will forever be one of my favorite movies, despite what some films critics say...
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Acting...Utterly predictable story...
Review: SLING BLADE is an actor's movie. Billy Bob Thornton does a fine job(Karl)as does the entire cast; particularly J.T.Walsh(the obnoxious BUSHMAN) in some truly screwy mono-dialogues between Karl and himself.However, the plot--action;inaction; UNshockingly violent climax-- is utterly predictable. I'm astonished at acclaim heaped on this film: OVER 25 CRITICS AGREE, "One of the Year's Top Ten!" Are these doyen(ne)s so easily overwhelmed? Or is this existential parable...actually a transparent exercise in Hollywood PCine-morality...what Post-Modernists contend surpasses DeMillian epic with fables of anti-wisemen dealing with INAPPROPRIATE BEHAVIOR? (Smoking's now condemned. SLING-BLADing infants: 1-every-23-seconds for 30 years is legal & approved.) The movie's okay. But to regard it as profound, ethical revelation in film making is absurd.I believe Karl and young Frank, contrary to tumultuous approval of 25 Critics, would agree.
Rating:
Summary: Without Question, Billy Bob's Best
Review: There are those born into this world with a seemingly endless capacity for "life"-- those with the mental wherewithal and ability to embrace and appreciate the endless bounties that nature has to offer. And then there are those less fortunate; those who lack that acuity of mind and must content themselves with more immediate pleasures, like simply drawing breath in a world that has judged and declared them an accident of birth and has summarily withdrawn it's promise to them, deeming them somehow unworthy, and subsequently refusing to offer them more than the basic sustenances of survival, viewing them too often as so much refuse, with no intrinsic value whatsoever. An abhorrent philosophy, to be sure, and yet one too often embraced by those better equipped, those who should know better and who should make it their business to reach out and at the very least attempt to discover what even the least among us has to offer, and to offer something in return. It's a proposition put forth by writer/director/star Billy Bob Thornton, in "Sling Blade," an emotionally charged drama that seeks out the best within the least of us. And finds it. After spending his entire adult life in a mental institution because of a crime he committed as a child, Karl Childers (Thornton) has been declared "well," and is released from the "nervous hospital" (as he calls it) that has been his home these many years. Born "simple," the product of morally deficient parents, Karl neither demands nor expects anything from life; indeed, he wouldn't know how to. His is a life devoid of hopes or dreams, as in point of fact, these are things he does not know even exist. From the moment of his birth up until the day he entered the institution, Karl's life has been nothing more than a stoic and innate quest for survival. And now, thrown back into the world, he returns to the small Arkansas town where he grew up. When Karl gets to town and steps off the bus, he is alone and with nowhere to go. Hungry, he soon discovers the joys of "french fried potaters," which he gets at a fast food joint. Circumstances then bring him into contact with a twelve-year-old boy, Frank (Lucas Black), and the two quickly "make friends," in the purest sense, thanks to Frank's intuitive response, generated by the non judgmental innocence of youth, which allows the boy to see Karl as a person, rather than as an object of disdain. And this simple act of friendship awakens in Karl something he has never known. For the first time, perhaps, Karl has a reason to be. Billy Bob Thornton is an enigma; Offstage, he seems perpetually attached to controversy, while as an artist, he never ceases to amaze. As an actor/filmmaker he has consistently demonstrated true genius, which has never been more apparent than with this film, in which he presents a perspective on life that issues from a depth of staggering proportions. With this story of perfect imperfection, he indicates the possibility that a perfect world can be achieved through the efforts of imperfect people; but that, unfortunately, those who deem themselves as "perfect" must also participate, which results in a world that is ultimately and unavoidable imperfect, and in a way that is forever unalterable. We are stuck with what we have, then, but the film's message is clear: we do have choices; and as such, the imperfect can have a positive impact-- through care and understanding, the world can at least be a better place. It's a dramatic statement to make, and Thornton makes it directly, through the insightful presentation of his characters, all of whom are sharply drawn, honest and definitive, and with situations and dialogue that rings true throughout the film. Still, some of the most telling moments are found in the silence of Karl's reflections; those "moments" that allow the viewer to process and digest the drama of the story as it unfolds, and which adds depth to the overall perspective of how Karl views the world, and how the world views Karl. On the surface, Karl seems as enigmatic as his creator, but it's a perception due mainly to Karl's retiring, undemonstrable countenance, born of the incessant repression of his spirit and any and all vestiges of the humanity alive within him but unable to break free. In Karl, Thornton has created a character who is something of a study in contradiction, a complex individual who at his core is actually quite simple and uncomplicated, yet possessed of deep-seated emotions fettered by the constraints of his environment and his lack of mental proficiency. And Thornton so ably conveys the depth of Karl's feelings-- emotions he is so desperately trying to understand and express-- that he becomes oddly endearing and readily evokes the empathy of the audience. Without question, this is Thornton's most emotionally powerful performance ever, for which he deservedly earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actor (in a year in which Geoffrey Rush took home the gold for "Shine"). Director Thornton supported his dynamic portrayal of Karl by extracting some extraordinary performances from his terrific cast of actors, beginning with the work of young Lucas Black, who presents Frank in terms that are altogether natural and unassuming. Dwight Yoakam, too, elicits a highly emotional response by creating a character, Doyle Hargraves, who is absolutely insufferable; this is the guy you love to hate. And John Ritter is effective as the supportive Vaughan Cunningham, turning in a performance that is quite real and convincing, as does Natalie Canerday, as Frank's mother, Linda. Also notable in supporting roles are J.T. Walsh, as one of Karl's fellow mental patients, a loathsome individual named Charles Bushman; James Hampton, as Jerry, the director of the institution; Rick Dial, as Bill Cox; and Brent Briscoe as Scooter Hodges. A remarkable and unforgettable film, "Sling Blade" is a journey of emotional discovery that is absorbing and absolute.
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