A
Time to Kill
Description of Film:
Joel Schumacher (The Phantom of the Opera)
directs this incredibly powerful tale of justice
and injustice in the south. Samuel Jackson (Star
Wars) beautifully portrays Carl Lee Hailey,
a Mississippi man whose 10-year-old daughter
has just been raped and beaten by two white
men. After Hailey takes the law into his
own hands, he needs a lawyer desperately. Matthew
McConaughey (Reign of Fire) turns in
an excellent performance as Jake Brigance, the
young lawyer who defends Hailey during his time
of need. Kevin Spacey (Beyond the
Sea) is exceptional as the District Attorney
who prosecutes the case. Other members
of this all-star cast include Donald Sutherland
(Cold Mountain) as Lucien Wilbanks,
Brigance’s former mentor; Charles S. Dutton
(Secret Window) as the sheriff; Sandra
Bullock (Miss Congeniality II) as the
brilliant law student turned legal assistant;
Oliver Platt (Kinsey) as Harry Rex
Vonner, Brigance’s friend; and Ashley
Judd (De-Lovely) as Brigance’s
wife.
The story really takes off when Hailey’s
case goes to court. The case becomes a
full blown national issue when the ACLU, the
NAACP, and the Ku Klux Klan get involved. The
case becomes a highly charged racial issue that
has both sides in upheaval.
This movie is rated R for violence and graphic
language.
Why I Recommend It:
This movie is very powerful. It makes
you wonder how a case like this might unfold
in real life. Would people respond the
same way? Would it raise the same questions
about race, prejudice, and justice? Would
it become a heated, national issue as it did
in A Time to Kill? The film also
is of high quality. There is some amazing
dialogue in this movie. I also loved the
screenplay.
Why This is Important:
This movie is important because it gets to the
heart of a several key issues. For instance,
it asks whether a Black person can get a fair
trial in this country, even today? How
do you make sense of the statistics that show
that Black men in the U.S. make up a disproportionate
amount of the prison population. Second,
this movie looks at “justice” from
different angles. Is vigilante justice
acceptable when it comes to an extreme incident
like the rape of a child? Does a court
of law always provide justice? Third,
this movie is important because speech plays
such a vital role in it. The film contains
amazing monologues that really get to the heart
of race relations in America.
Written by John Grisham
Favorite Quotation:Jake
Brigance: “And until we can see each other
as equals, justice is never going to be even-handed.
It will remain nothing more than a reflection
of our own prejudices.” |
