With unprecedented access, The Condemned  takes viewers into the hidden world of one of Russia’s most impenetrable and remote institutions: Penal Colony 56, a maximum security prison exclusively for murderers.

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In the dark heart of Russia, this is the end of the line for some of Russia’s most dangerous criminals

– 260 men who have collectively killed nearly 800 people. In brutally frank and uncensored interviews the inmates speak of their crimes, life and death, redemption and remorselessness, freedom and families, insanity and hope.

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The film tracks them though their unending, unrelenting days over several months, lifting the veil on one of Russia’s most secretive subcultures to reveal what happens when a man is locked up in a tiny cell, for 23 hours, day after day, for life.