Sling Blade is a 1996 American
drama film set in rural
Arkansas, written and directed by
Billy Bob Thornton, who also stars in the lead role. It tells the story of a man named Karl Childers who has a developmental disability and is released from a
psychiatric hospital, where he has lived since killing his mother and her lover when he was 12 years old, and the friendship he develops with a young boy and his mother. In addition to Thornton, it stars
Dwight Yoakam,
J. T. Walsh,
John Ritter,
Lucas Black,
Natalie Canerday,
James Hampton, and
Robert Duvall.