Bruce Jackson and Diane Christian had unusual access to prisoners for their remarkable and very watchable film Death Row (1979). They show daily life and routine pastimes on death row in a Texas prison. The visual texture, not surprisingly, is characterized by the verticals of cell bars, while the audio background features the dull drone of the television set that always seems to be on. Jackson and Christian's portraits of the men don't mention the crimes that sent them to death row; at least one of the men was later exonerated.
