***SPOILERS*** Some dozen peoples lives intersect at one place on October 22 in L.A and the results is an explosion that ends with the death of most of them. Gary, Michael Pare, is at the end of his rope with him losing his job and girlfriend Maggie, Erika Anderson. Thrown out of his apartment and living in his car with it about to be taken away from him for failure to pay off the car-loan to the bank Gary goes to the local pawn shop and pawns away his expensive watch for a handgun. Not being able to face the world anymore Gary decides to put an end to it all by blowing his brains out.
There's are a number of other people in the movie with problems not as serious as Gary's but serious enough to have them go off the deep end. One of them is sweet and kind-hearted Arthur, Ernie Hudson. Arthur is fixated with his next door neighbor Denise, Amanda Plummer, who he's been secretly spying on for years taking thousands of photos of her.
In the film is public relations man Peter,Tate Donovan, and the girl of his dreams Andrea ,Maylin Pultar, and hurt and depressed Carol,Donna Murphy, who's husband Matthew, Joesph Arsenault, left her after a fifteen year marriage for his new secretary. There's also both her's and Matthews friend Steve, Colm Meaney, who tries to patch things up between the two but becomes the object of Carol's affections. Finally there's Bob, Mark Boone Jr, a car mechanic who's son's birthday is today, October 22. All these people come together, as if by fate, at Helen's Restaurant for what turns out to be for them a violent and blood-splattering last supper.The movie "October 22" shows how the pressure of living in a in a major 20th century metropolis, with people for the most part being totally unconscious to each other feelings, can drive someone insane to the point of mass murder.
Longing for her friendship Arthur opens himself up to Denise but his obsessive attention towards her completely turned Denise off. Hurt and enraged at Denise's rejection of, what he feels, his good intentions Authur goes from a kindly and lovable Teddy-Bear type of person into an insane and homicidal maniac. Arming himself to the teeth Arthur drives into town to where Denise works as a waitress, Helen's Restaurant, where all the previously mentioned people in the film just happen to be dining!
It's also outside Helen's that Gary is sitting in an alley way with a gun to his mouth trying to find the courage to pull the trigger. As it turns out it's Arthur who pulls the trigger first. It's that very timely and deadly event that gives Gary a reason for living not just for himself but for the people who are, unknowingly to him at the time, about to be slaughtered.
Shocking disturbing yet in a way heart-lifting movie about one's redemption in the mist of total chaos and destruction and how when under the most trying and brutal of circumstances is what brings the best, as well as worst, out of all of us.
