The Next Three Days

The Next Three Days is a 2010 American action thriller film written and directed by Paul Haggis and starring Russell Crowe and Elizabeth Banks. It was released in the United States on November 19, 2010, and was filmed on location in Pittsburgh. It is a remake of the 2008 French film Pour elle (Anything for Her) by Fred Cavayé and Guillaume Lemans. Plot In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Lara Brennan is sentenced to life in prison for murder. Three years later, her young son Luke ceases to acknowledge her during prison visits, despite the efforts of her husband John. Following the failure of Lara's appeal, her lawyer urges John to accept the evidence: after a public fight with her boss, Lara was seen leaving the parking lot where her boss was bludgeoned with a fire extinguisher; though Lara claims to have bumped into the real suspect, her fingerprints were on the murder weapon and the victim's blood was found on her coat. Out of legal options, Lara attempts suicide, and John becomes determined to break her out of prison. John consults former inmate Damon Pennington, who wrote a book about his seven prison escapes, and makes the necessary preparations over the next three months, studying the routines inside Allegheny County Jail. Attempting to buy fake passports from a drug dealer, he is directed to a bar where he is instead beaten and robbed by the dealer and his friend. A deaf motorcyclist from the bar later sells him the forged documents for $3,700, and John buys a handgun. Nearly caught testing a bump key inside the jail, a panicked John is seen vomiting outside by the detectives who arrested Lara; they follow him home, suspicious that he has sold the house and his belongings. John also learns how to break into the van for the medical lab that conducts Lara's diabetes testing. Learning that Lara will be transferred to a high-security prison in three days, John is unable to close the house sale in time and prepares to rob a bank, but cannot go through with it, and nearly runs over a mother and her child in his stress. A visit with Lara leads to an argument and, in a fit of quiet rage, she declares she is guilty, but John refuses to believe her. He tails a local drug dealer to a meth lab, setting fire to the building and taking the cash at gunpoint, but a shoot-out leaves one of the criminals dead.