Beyond the Call on AllMovie

In this well-wrought, moving drama from Hallmark Productions, a wife and mother puts her home life on the line when she launches a campaign to keep her ex-boyfriend, a convicted killer, off death row. Pam O'Brien (Sissy Spacek) loved Russell Gates (David Strathairn) in high school, but afterwards, he went to Vietnam and she carried on with her life, marrying Keith (Arliss Howard) and starting a family. When she learns that Russell is about to be executed for murdering a cop and that he is not appealing his case, she visits him in prison. There she is shocked to find a man destroyed by his wartime experiences. She continues her visits and slowly finds herself contending with long unresolved feelings for Russell. Her increased attentions to the jailed man only adds greater tremors to an already shakey relationship with Keith, and for a while Pam is in danger of losing everyone important to her.