Dead Man Walking (film) Dead Man Walking (film) Dead Man Walking is a 1995 American crime drama film starring Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn, and co-produced and directed by Tim Robbins, who adapted the screenplay from the non-fiction book of the same name. Sister Helen Prejean (Sarandon) establishes a special relationship with Matthew Poncelet (Penn) – based on real-life murderers Elmo Patrick Sonnier and Robert Lee Willie – a prisoner on death row in Louisiana, acting as his spiritual adviser after carrying on correspondence with him. Matthew Poncelet has been in prison for six years, awaiting his execution after being sentenced to death for
Susan Sarandon playing Patrice Kahlman and Sarah Fairbanks, respectively. In 1975, she appeared in "The Rocky Horror Picture Show". That same year, she also played the female lead in "The Great Waldo Pepper", opposite Robert Redford. She was twice directed by Louis Malle, in "Pretty Baby" (1978) and "Atlantic City" (1981). The latter earned Sarandon her first Academy Award nomination. Her most controversial film appearance was in Tony Scott's "The Hunger" (1983), a modern vampire story in which she had a lesbian sex scene with Catherine Deneuve. She appeared in the comedy-fantasy "The Witches of Eastwick" (1987) alongside Jack Nicholson, Cher, and