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d. Jonathan Kaplan; pr. Stanley R. Jaffe, Sherry Lansing; scr. Tom Topor; ph. Ralf Bode; m. Brad Fiedel; ed. O. Nicholas Brown, Jerry Greenberg; cast. Jodie Foster, Kelly McGillis, Bernie Coulson, Leo Rossi, Ann Hearn, Carmen Argenziano (111 mins)

ACCUSED FACTS: PROMOTION - Emphasizing the progress from victimization to justice, the marketers chose the tagline "The first scream was for help. The second is for justice." (read more); FILM TALES - Jodie Foster, who fought to get the role, thought her work in the film so awful that she was ready to abandon acting altogether, until she won the Academy Award for her work; co-star Kelly McGillis was originally sought to play the Foster role but as McGillis had survived a rape and sexual assault herself she declined and pursued the character of the lawyer; SPONSOR DETAILS: This review of Ghost Dog is sponsored by Inkstone Digital - the latest ebooks for as low as $8.95 with new titles added weekly (read more); Scrolling News Ticker by Mioplanet;

The Accused re-introduced audiences to Jodie Foster, then known primarily for her work in Taxi Driver as an adolescent, and Foxes.

Indeed, following her Oscar success for The Accused she was thrust so much into the critical spotlight that by the time of her second Academy Award triumph for Silence of the Lambs she was in demand as one of Hollywood’s top stars. A similar career trajectory, though without the longevity, would befall director Jonathan Kaplan. One of the lesser known directors to emerge from the Roger Corman “family” of low-budget filmmakers, Kaplan had persevered anonymously within the light exploitation field before venturing directly into the cinema of controversy with The Accused. The film’s success suddenly made him a serious, provocative director willing and able to tackle problematic subjects. But as good as Foster’s performance was and as effective as Kaplan proved himself, the conversation-piece subject matter is what galvanized audiences, the film being indeed one of the rarer Hollywood movies to confront rape in terms of what the abhorrent crime implies about contemporary society and its moral priorities. Indeed, Kaplan insisted upon depicting a culture that fosters violent sexual abuse as a spectator sport, an issue upon which Kaplan ultimately places his calculated call for patriarchal self-assessment. Few popular films had managed to engage so successfully with sociological fears in the era of the blockbuster.

Jodie Foster plays a young woman who flees a bar. Taken to hospital, she reports a rape having occurred and is put through the routine hospital examination.

The perpetrators are arrested. Her lawyer (Kelly McGillis) has little regard for Foster and soon accepts a standard plea bargain deal for the rapists. Upon finding this out, Foster feels betrayed and lets McGillis know that she wanted more – specifically an acknowledgement of what had happened to her. McGillis gradually begins to have a crisis of conscience about her prior actions, not helped when she learns of Foster’s repeated problems. Realizing that she too may have betrayed her client’s trust, McGillis subsequently intends to prosecute those men who had cheered and clapped and urged on the rape as a form of criminal solicitation. Her bosses are skeptical of such a case succeeding but McGillis is determined to see it through. However, McGillis fears that Foster’s background may make her a problem witness in any trial. One potential witness, a young man who had observed the rape, is torn about his stance, on the one hand loyal to his friend, plea-bargained to a lesser charge and in jail, and on the other wholly outraged at what his friend had proven himself capable of doing. McGillis knows that this young man will be a key witness. Indeed, when the trial begins, it seems that the testimony of this one male witness may determine the verdict.

The Accused is a film about outrage: that rape is a horrid crime that still does not provoke the sense of disdain from patriarchal society that it should. As a crime, rape remains the one sign of continued male resentment and hatred of women, though still excused and dismissed as a lesser offense through legal wrangling.

The film thus follows Foster’s desire to reveal the horror of what she went through to a sympathetic person, a woman, and thus through her to society at large. Foster wants to be heard, to be allowed a voice with which to express her outrage. But McGillis does not recognize this at first – she is one of the boys, going with her male companions to sporting events and joining their greater indifference. Through Foster’s influence, McGillis realizes that she must enable the rape victim to have a voice in the legal process at all costs, even if the victim has a flawed character. That Foster is a drug user, a possible alcoholic and almost “white trash” does not diminish her suffering or her right to be heard – or at least it shouldn’t. There is here the idea that a persistent class-based prejudice regarding socio-economic status influences American viewpoints. The film’s key point is thus the need for a social examination of this abhorrent crime as initiated by the due expression of outrage at such a crime. This idea of expression – being personal, social and legal – hence saturates the first half of the film.

The second half, however, re-focuses this feminist dialectic within the problems now facing such expression within a male dominated culture. The solidarity between Foster and McGillis needs to establish that sexual violence is condoned in certain circles, but to do so they have to rely on the testimony of a sympathetic male witness.

The character of this witness is thus crucial to the film’s intentions. It is clear that women are deeply offended by rape but it is the film’s intent to imply that a new generation of men must also show the necessary outrage, but with some removed objectivity needed for legal validation. Men thus have an imperative to speak out for it is their testimony that will ultimately affect true change in a patriarchal system. Hence, it is the young male’s flashback of what happened, and not Foster’s own memory, that is visualized as proof for the viewer. It is a deliberate choice that encourages the male viewer of the film to sympathize with the outraged male. Kaplan wishes to show men the true horror of not only rape but the attitude that would encourage rape as a form of entertainment and as a grotesque male bonding rite. For Kaplan, this is a spillover of the larger male culture that celebrates violence (in one scene those who cheer the rape are paralleled to the crowd at a boxing match). Although the rape scene is uncomfortable viewing it is necessary to invite the intended sense of male outrage.

Rape is Always a Troublesome Subject
an extract from Robert Cettl's book Film Tales: Movie Trivia in the Age of DVD (on sale now)

The studio head of Paramount Pictures hated the proposed screen treatment of the film The Accused feeling it an esoteric rape movie better suited to television and a non-event as a movie without a strong male role to hold it together. However, the script did feature strong female roles, was based on a headline making rape case and had initially attracted the main interest of star Jane Fonda. Fonda wanted the script re-written by a woman first but when the script proved unsatisfactory, bowed out of the project. Kelly McGillis was then a rising star having been featured in both Top Gun and Witness and agreed to do the film, although she did not want to portray the rape victim, herself having been raped some years before. The producer finally convinced the studio head to finance the film by promising to keep the budget extremely low, so that the studio would not lose much if the film flopped, as the studio head felt that it would inevitably do. For the role of the rape victim, the producers turned to an actress then wrapped up in doubts about her acting career and thinking of even abandoning it – Jodie Foster – although at first they didn’t even want to audition her for the part. In the end, Foster won an Academy Award for the role and the film was a hit.

The anamorphic widescreen transfer is clean, with deep black levels and a fine sense of subdued versus expressive colours within an overall naturalistic design that is true to place. This sense of place reveals a rather ugly social reality. Indeed, there is an overall sense of inhospitability to the film despite its technical polish and the gloss associated with well-made Hollywood production values in the 1980s. This well-lit cinematographic realism carries the subtle sense of actuality: while this is calculated and revealing of an overall professionalism, it does not seem overly strained and nor does it reveal any deliberately stylistic flourishes to distract from the issues at hand. The film’s style is subdued as in design and look it is thus functionally restrained. Nevertheless, Kaplan’s compositional interests still show through in the film’s use of colour, shadow and reflections, particularly during the barroom scenes. The transfer’s minimal definition problems are visible in some of the night scenes and also with some of the darker colour blocks. Generally, the better lit the film image is, the clearer it is on transfer. Importantly, the transfer captures the play on gender points of view so integral to the notion of spectatorship addressed in the film and flawlessly captures the shocking vividness of the rape scene, its barroom atmosphere held in contrast to the cold courtroom in which the flashback is told to the jury.

Sound
The sound transfer is offered in Dolby Digital 5.1 and in this it is always full and resonant when needed. The score is clear (with drums especially crisp) but shows a heavy bass at times. Dialogue and performance are ultimately more important than any sound effects, although such diegetic effects are well judged and contribute to a sense of rather awful, drab ordinariness (in weather and the realistic, even banal, sounds of ordinary life in the film’s varied places) that serves as a fine counterpoint to the horror possible within it – suggesting such action born of ennui and discontent. It creates an authentic, familiar environment and sound levels are well judged to emphasize the impact of certain moments as key emotional expressions. The auditory immersion in the rape sequence in particular makes it all the more harrowing. Voices are clear and distinct, the changes for instance allowing one to measure Foster’s growing need for expression. Her discovery of her own voice is here one of the key motifs: rape as an unfortunately politicizing event in her life. The score is capable of being ominous, outraged and tender and is drawn upon selectively. There is also a notably clever interplay in the controversial rape sequence as background voices slowly become dominant – suggesting how what is accepted as everyday can transform into something more monstrous. This transition is especially well captured in this transfer.