This is the true story of Robert E Burns, a real-life American Jean Valjean, whose brutal treatment, when sentenced to be manacled to a state of Georgia chain gang for a $5 theft, eventually led to a reform of America's brutal penal laws. Burns (given the fictional name of James Allen) was played by Paul Muni in a tour de force performance in the classic 1932 prison drama I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang, and pretty-boy Val Kilmer (flush from his success as Tom Cruise's adversary `Ice Man' in Top Gun) finds it a tough job filling his shoes in this made-for-cable TV film. It's a hard-hitting if often predictable drama, but does have one or two bursts of excitement to maintain our interest through what proves to be rather a long haul.


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