Injustice Against Women in Three Movies
The first movie I will discuss here is The Accused. Released in 1988, the movie tells the story of a young womans fight for justice after she is raped by three men. The audience does not find out what actually happened until the very end, but we do know that a rape has just taken place as Jodie Foster, playing Sarah Tobias, is seen rushing out of a bar in torn clothes while a young man (Bernie Coulson playing Kenneth Joyce) is seen reporting the rape to the police dispatcher over a public phone. From this dramatic opening the movie moves through several ups and down and it is only towards the end that the audience gets to see the actual rape. But the story deliberately unfolds in a manner that confuses the audience about Sarahs role in her getting raped.
In the first half of the movie, the audience is led to believe that Sarah was a woman with loose character who had the rape coming. While still I hospital, she is visited by the other main character in this movie, the Deputy District Attorney, Kathryn Murphy, played by Kelly McGillis. Kathryns initial reaction on seeing the case files seems to be that of cold indifference. It is obvious that she is here to do her job, and the fact that Sarah was drunk and on drugs did not help the rape case. Around this time, the movie also begins to slowly and systematically discredit Sarah. In a shot, which seems unimportant at the time, the camera focuses on a cars license plates which read SXY SADI. Once we realize that the car belongs to Sarah, it becomes easy to think of her as someone who would have invited rape on her. The next few scenes establish Sarahs less than perfect background. She tells Kathryn that she came from a broken home and that her father left her mother before she was born. We find that she lives in a trailer and when she calls her mother and expresses a desire to visit, her mother turns her down. In all these scenes, the director, Jonathan Kaplan, seems to play with the audience leading them on to doubt Sarahs creditability.
Despite these negative allusions in the opening scenes, the audience is also able to sympathize with Sarah as she encounters people who all react in different ways to her predicament. In the hospital, the nurse asks Sarah a series of private questions about her sex life while she is being photographed. Although the nurse seems to sympathize with Sarah, it becomes quickly apparent that the process of getting justice can be even more demeaning than the actual rape. In these initial hospital scenes, Sarah looks confused and distraught, not quite sure how she should react. Foster has given exceptional performance here, bringing out aptly a young girls confusion after such a violent, life-altering incident. She continues to give superb performance as she accompanies the police back to the bar and recognizes two of her assaulters. The audience can see a mixture of fear and hatred on her face as she points out the attackers. Fosters superb acting allows the audience to realize that the woman must really be suffering. If the hospital scene and the scene at bar bring out her predicament, her interactions with her boyfriend Larry (Tom OBrien), make us aware of her loneliness. After all she has been through, she is unable to find comfort from the people she is closest to. All these things make the audience sympathize with Sarah.
As the movie progresses, this dilemma in the audiences mind as to whether to sympathize with Sarah or to hold her partly responsible for her rape is further heightened. After the rapists get bail, their lawyer makes it sound like it was all entirely Sarahs fault. Although such public statements by defense lawyers are to be taken with a pinch of salt, but it still leaves a doubt in the audience minds, even though Sarah refutes any such suggestion. Next we see Sarah drinking in the middle of the day to smooth out the edges, and the audience is forced to think if she might be an alcoholic who might have an invited sexual overtures after a drink too many. To add to that, when Kathryn asks her about the drinking, she says that sometimes she takes a hit of pot or something. In fact, she tells Kathryn that she had had half a joint, a couple of beers before she went to the bar. Obviously, this is a troubled woman who has made some questionable decisions in her life. To make matters worse, she even has a record with police for possession of illegal substance. Kathryn asks Sarah pointed questions about her behavior and dress which obviously do not go down well with Sarah. Sarahs outburst in the scene can be interpreted both as an indignant womans reaction to the unfairness of the system, or as anger being used to cover her faults. In all these scenes, the audience is not sure if Sarah was really raped and if raped, had she in some way invited it upon herself. Of course, the idea of the movie is that even if Sarah had indeed invited the assault, she still had a right to say no. But there is enough ambiguity to leave a doubt in the audiences mind.
As the movie proceeds, we realize that not only is Sarahs case weak, by even Kathryn is not really convinced about the rape and definitely does not think that she can win it. During a discussion with the Chief District Attorney, she makes it clear that this is not a winnable case and that if they were to go to trial, they would definitely lose. The Chief District Attorney advices her to make a deal with defense and get the rapists behind bar on charge that works. Kathryn takes his advice and make a deal with the defense for a reduced charge of reckless endangerment which carries a sentence of two and half year with the option to go out on parole after one year. Kathryn feels that under the circumstances she has got a good deal but Sarah feels that she has been sold out. In another outburst, Sarah barges into Kathryns home and tries to make Kathryn understand how she feels. Once again, Fosters acting makes the scene stand out. Sarah does not have the vocabulary to express herself and how she feels. But her anger at what had happened to her and how she was being treated by the District Attorney comes out clearly in this scene.
As Sarah tries to come to terms with the reality she breaks up with her boyfriend who was having a hard time dealing with the situation. She tries to put her past behind her and move on with her life. But during a shopping trip, she encounters a man who tries to get friendly with her. The man turns out to be one of the onlookers who had cheered on while Sarah was getting raped. He starts to tease and berate her and block her car with his pickup. Unsure what to do, we see Sarah snap as she rams her car repeatedly in to the pickup. She lands up in the hospital and when Kathryn meets her there, Sarahs situation makes her realize that she made a mistake. For the first time in the movie we see Kathryn moved enough by Sarahs predicament to have tears in her life. She decides that she has to do something to get justice for Sarah and spends the night preparing the case. After much reading, she finds a law which allows her to try the onlooker who cheered on the rape on the charges of criminal solicitation. The Chief District Attorney thinks that she does not have a case and tries to dissuade her without any success. Kathryn once again starts researching the case and gets Sally, Sarahs friend who was at the bar on the night of the rape, to identify some of the onlookers from a line-up. Sally identifies three men. Later while Kathryn is interviewing Sally for the case, she tells her that before getting raped, Sarah had said that she wanted to have sex with one of the guys who eventually raped her. Although she insists that it was a joke, the revelation once again puts a doubt in Kathryn and audiences mind about Sarahs credibility. Just as the audience had started sympathizing with Sarah, the director once again plants a doubt in the audiences mind. At the point it seems that Kathryn might be fighting a lost cause but she finds Kenneth Joyce, the man who had tried to report the rape. Kenneth agrees to testify in the court, then changes his mind but finally, after being confronted by Sarah decides to tell the whole story. It is finally at this point, that we get to see what had actually happened in the bar in a flashback as Kenneth tells his story.
As we watch the events leading up to the rape and the actual rape, we finally realize the message that the movie was trying to give all along. Although Sarah was indeed dressed provocatively, heavily drunk and even flirted with the men, she, like every other woman in the world, had every right to say no. A persons profession, character, behavior or past records do not make it alright to be raped. The movie, in a very forceful manner, brings across he point that a rape can never be justifiable. The director succeeds in his attempt by intentionally keeping the actual incidents in the dark and allowing the audience to form a negative opinion about Sarah. As a result, when the actual happenings of the night are revealed, the audience is forced to confront their prejudices.
Jodie Foster as Sarah Tobias gives a startling performance. Despite the script trying to discredit her all along, the audience is able to sympathize with her even though they may not believe her. Her fight for justice comes across as an incoherent, hysterical and confused struggle, as it reflects the characters background and upbringing. Yet, despite all the weaknesses in Sarahs character, when the movie ends, the audience is forced to accept that she had been wronged and deserved to get justice just like any other woman.
The second movie is Nuts, starring Barbara Streisand in the lead role. Nuts is essentially a court room drama in which Streisands character, Claudia Draper, fights for her right to receive a fair trial after the lawyer appointed by her family and the court appointed psychiatrist try to prove that she is mentally incompetent to stand trial. The movie is almost entirely played out in the court room, with key insights in to Claudias past being revealed through the testimonies of the witnesses and brief flashbacks.
As the movie starts we learn that Claudia is in the court on the charges of manslaughter in the first degree. The state moves to declare her mentally incompetent to stand trial based on psychiatrist report but Claudia objects to this. When her lawyer tries to reason with her, she attacks him and as a result, the lawyer drops the case and immediately leaves. The judge is forced to appoint a public defender, Aaron Lewinski (Richard Dreyfuss) who challenges the mentally incompetent charge placed by the state. In these initial sequences, Claudias body language and her behavior do come across as abnormal and the audience is led to believe that Claudia may really be mentally ill.
As Lewinski leaves the court, he is stopped by Claudias parents who insist that Claudia is sick and so should not be forced to stand trial. At this point, they come across as concerned parents while Claudia seems to be a troubled, rebellious child they are trying to protect. On his way to meet Claudia, he happens to meet Dr. Morrison, one of the psychiatrists who had declared Claudia incompetent. When asked, Dr. Morrison insists that Claudia is indeed sick and should not go to prison. Lewinskis first interaction with Claudia does not start on a positive note with Claudia at first simply staring at him in a catatonic way and then suddenly screaming at him for no apparent reason. It takes Lewinski some time to win her trust after which he decides that Claudia is indeed competent enough to stand the trial and he will represent him in the competency hearing rather than have her committed. However, when he approaches the district attorney for help, he tries to dissuade him, mentioning that Claudias father does not want her to go to trial. The movie reveals the truth behind Claudias behavior and the reason why she is in jail in bits and pieces and this is the first of those pieces. Claudias father had earlier seemed concerned about Claudias health but now it seems that he actually wants to prove that she is crazy.
As the movie progresses, the audience is allowed to form their own opinion about Claudias mental health. Unfortunately, Claudias behavior during her interactions with Dr. Morrison does not help her case as she comes across as a deeply disturbed person. Meanwhile, Lewinski visits Claudias apartment and brings her clothes including her undergarments. When Claudia realizes that Lewinski may have gone through her personal stuff, she loses her temper and once again starts screaming and shouting at him, even though she had been behaving quite well until then. These sudden mood swings have the affect of confusing the audience. At this point we also learn that Claudia was a highly paid call girl and that the reason she was facing trial was because she had murdered one of her clients in an act of self defense.
During the court proceedings, Claudia keeps interfering and interjecting and keeps disturbing the flow despite repeated warnings from the judge and Lewinski. Once again, the audience is led to believe that Claudia may indeed be unstable although she could also be simply angry at being put in an unjust situation. During the questioning of Dr. Morrison, we learn that during her stay at the mental hospital, Claudia had also attacked another woman, thus further weakening her case and putting more doubt in the audience minds. Dr. Morrison also reveals that Claudia came from a broken home and a broken marriage. This mention of her coming from a broken home, coupled with her earlier outburst at being called by her fathers name, Kirk, makes the audience realize that he may not be her real father.
When Lewinski wants to call Claudias mother to stand, Claudia strongly, almost violently objects to it forcing Lewinski to ask for a recess. During the recess, her hostile behavior towards her parents gives another clue to the reason behind Claudias problems. During her mothers testimonial, she reveals that Claudia began to withdrew in to herself at around the age of eleven and later there was a period of promiscuity. She goes on to describe a violent incident when Claudia was sixteen. During the entire testimonial, Claudia, who had been very vocal until now and constantly disturbing the court proceedings, chooses to remain absolutely quiet. In fact, when Lewinski tries to cross-question Claudias mother, Claudia objects by tapping loudly against a glass. Striesands acting at this time is exceptional as it brings out her pain. Even though at the point the audience has no idea what is the cause of her suffering, we can empathize with her for whatever it was that caused her to feel so much pain. Also the realization that it was her own mother who had let her down can be very disturbing.
The next testimonial is that of her stepfather and this proves to be the turning point of the story. Although Claudia had not suffered her background with Lewinski, when Claudia retorts sharply to her mothers comment that Kirk would never hurt Claudia, Lewinski suddenly realizes the reason behind aggressive behavior. We soon learn that it was because her stepfather molested her until she was sixteen and had she not turned violent at that age, he might have continued to do so. Striesands performance in this scene is exceptional, bringing out the years of pain that the young girl must have gone through.
The revelation also makes us realize that even though the movie is only concerned with her fighting for her right to stand fair trial, Claudia was a woman who had been fighting her own battles from a very young age. It also explains her distrust for everybody. Any person who had been let down by the people they trust most will always have problems trusting other people.
During her own testimonial, Claudia demonstrates her perfect understanding of the situation she was in, despite being under the influence of medicines. She also displays her exceptional wit, turning to judge in a playful manner to ask if something was legal or not before answering. And when the district attorney tries to discredit her by indirectly asking her about her profession, she goes into an explicit description of what she does for a living, making everyone in the courtroom squirm. Streisands acting during this scene and a scene later when she has another one of her outbursts as she tries to convince the judge that she was not mad is truly outstanding.
Claudia finally wins her right to get a fair trial but the process for her turns out to extremely painful one as her long kept secrets are revealed. As we learn more about Claudias past, we can better understand her behavior. Streisands performance plays a great part in helping us appreciate the pain that the young girl must have gone through as well as the trials she is facing at present when the system is somehow conspiring to keep her from getting her right of a fair trial. Although there is nothing exceptional about Nuts and the audience is able to guess half way through what the young girl must have experienced during the childhood, Streisands performance makes it special. As a young woman fighting against the system which allows a man to get away with raping a minor while does not give a woman even a chance to get a fair trial, Streisand brings out the various aspects of the character beautifully.
The third film under consideration in this essay is Born in Flames, a movie set in a fictional future, ten years after a socialist democratic party comes to power. In this new society, women, homosexuals and minorities are discriminated against and do not get the rights they deserve. The movie shows women getting fired from their work for no reason other than the fact that they are women. The Party seems to believe that women should only do housework and hence discourages women from working by reducing funding for daycares and advertising that women should do more housework. In this fictional future, crime against women is also on rise. Although the Party claims that rape and prostitution rates are lower than what they were before the revolution, the realities on the road seem to be much different. Women are harassed, molested and even raped on streets in broad daylight. And the rapists manage to get away because the party believes that there are no good and bad people and the rapists can be rehabilitated while the victims, the women, are allowed to suffer.
Set in such grim background, the movie tells the story of several protest groups who are fighting the system in whatever ways they feel is the best. Two of the main protagonists of the movie are Isabel (Adele Bertei) and Honey (Honey) who both run their own radio stations. Isabel, a white lesbian, operates Radio Ragazza while Honey, an African American is at the helm of Radio Phoenix. Although against the oppressive laws of the Party, they are both moderates who believe that they can change the system through their radio programs. There is also a Womens Army led by Hilary Hurst (Hilary Hurst), which has a more militant agenda. And then there is Adelaide Norris (Jean Satterfield), an African American lesbian woman and a political activist.
Adelaide Norris, the two radio stations and Womens Army are under investigation by the FBI. The movie is filmed like documentary and when we learn a lot of things regarding the main protagonists from the FBI agents as they discuss these protestors while looking at their file photographs. While they are investigating all of these people, there special worry is the Womens Army which is more militant and extremely secret. The FBI agents find it extremely difficult to find information about the Womens Army which is divided into many parts and each of these parts has their own leaders, which are rotated every few days. The FBI realizes that in order to disband the Army, they have to capture leaders, but find it difficult to find out who the leaders are even after they break into the Womens Armys office.
Meanwhile, the women go about raising support for their cause in whatever way they can. The two radio stations and Adelaide Norris do this by trying to raise awareness among the citizens. On the other hand, the more militant Womens Army is actively trying to recruit more people. There are several scenes of demonstrations and protests by women. In one such scene, women holding placards are shown chanting We want JOB, so we can EAT.
This conflict between the Party and the protestors comes to a head when Adelaide Norris is picked up by FBI at the airport when she arrives at New York City and later found dead in her prison cell. The government insists that it was suicide, however, the activists suspect foul play and start questioning if it was murder. The Womens Army decides that the Government has gone too far and during a Presidential address to the nation to get support for a proposal to pay women for housework, they storm in to the CBS station with guns, interrupt the broadcast and using the pictures of Adelaide Norris released by the Government, declare that Norris dead was not a suicide but a murder.
The news immediately mobilizes a lot more people and both Isabel and Honey express their desire to join the Womens Army, even though on an earlier occasion they had both refused because they felt that they could do better work through their newspaper. When Isabel and Homey start broadcasting inflammatory speeches in support of Womens army, their radio stations are mysteriously burned down. Not to be deterred, Isabel and Honey join hands to start a new radio station Phoenix Regazza Radio from the back of a van. In the meanwhile, the TV antenna on top of the World Trade Center is burnt down to prevent the government from telecasting their oppressive view points.
This movie is put together in a very incoherent way and its takes some time to understand what is going on. Also the performances by the lead actors were nothing noteworthy. The movie shows clear oppression of women from all walks of life. Unlike the other two movies discussed in this essay, this movie deals with the oppression and injustice on women in the entire society. But, because the poor production value fails to make an impact. Also the fictional setting of the movie does not help the cause.
On the whole, the three movies discussed in this paper each talk about wronged women and show different ways in which these women handle their problems. In The Accused, Sarah is shown as a poor barely educated young girl who does not know how to fight for her rights and so takes out her frustration on her lawyer whom she had come trust. In Nuts, Claudia is a wronged woman who is also not being given the right to get a fair trial and she fights for it by screaming and shouting and even violently attacking to get her way. And finally, in Born in Flames, the various groups of women come together to fight a society that oppresses women.
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