Dying in Prison
In 2006, Edgar Barens went to prison every day for six months. The Iowa State Penitentiary had granted the Chicago-based film-maker unprecedented access to shoot a documentary about the prison’s fledgling hospice program.
There, he met and filmed the eponymous lead of his film, Prison Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall, an 82-year-old World War II veteran and convicted murderer, suffering from heart disease and pneumonia. The 40-minute-long Academy Award-nominated documentary will air on HBO on March 31.
