This is How Movies Should Be Made

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

From my favorite movies..

Disappointment for a huge fan!

The Accused has three things that make it great: Kelly McGillis, Jodie Foster, and a case where lots of the blame is placed upon the victim. You must look at your own principles and see just how far in the wrong all the parties were, and the two leads make sure you think long and hard.Jodie Foster may be a child star, but this movie was her breakout role as an adult. Sure she did Taxi Driver before she was even a teenager, but in this we get the next stage of Jodie Foster. And out of all the roles in her illustrious career, I honestly think that her performance as Sarah Tobias stands as her best. Even better than Clarice Starling in Silence of the Lambs. Sure Silence is a better film than The Accused, but looking at both of Foster's performances it is clear that Sarah comes out superior. While Foster was the standout and the movie as a whole did receive praise, I just wish that there was more praise towards Kelly McGillis. She actually was a victim of rape when she was was young and initially wanted the part of Sarah. But she does just fine as the determined prosecutor Kathryn Murphy. Jodie Foster isn't that much better than McGillis. She is, but just by a little bit. McGillis plays the role with such conviction and power. So the general story of The Accused is a trashy young woman gets gang-raped in the back of a bar after they all get drunk, so she gets a lawyer to bring justice. The max that the rapers will get is 5 years in jail, but they will likely get out in less than a year. This is because since all the parties got drunk and Sarah was practically putting on a sleazy sex show, so she arguably instigated and provoked her own rape. I'm not siding with the perps or sympathizing with them, but she needed to be the one to control how much alcohol and pot she consumed. She is pretty low-class so she must know that creeps hang out in bars, she must have experience. But this movie is trying to say that no matter what, rape is NOT okay. The other part of the case deals with the hecklers who cheered while the rape was in session. Those guys get put behind bars, and the actual rapers get the full sentence. The lawyer that defends the hecklers is incredibly stupid as I just kept saying "Duuuuhhhhh!!" every time he finished a sentence. It is also during this last act when a flashback of the rape is shown through the honest eyes of an onlooker too scared to intervene. Even if law does not interest you, watch it just for Kelly McGillis and Jodie Foster.

A young woman is gang-raped in a bar. But charging the perpetrators with rape may not be a good idea because, frankly, the young woman may well have been asking for it. Does dressing and acting provocatively mean that you deserve to get raped?This film addresses the moral issues attached to rape very effectively, and features excellent performances from Kelly McGillis as the District Attorney tasked with pursuing the line most likely to meet with success, and from Oscar-winning Jodie Foster as the victim.This is disturbing stuff, but it is well written and brilliantly performed. It will leave you with considerable food for thought.

Not to get all political, but this movie, now 25 years old – and still one of my all-time favorites, holds up today. Meaning, I've been hearing a lot of recent chatter from a lot of outspoken conservative stations and advocates that women that dress proactively probably deserves the rape she got.Now, I'm sure that's a select few radicals – and sad, pathetic and misled idiots – but, that's what The Accused is mostly about.Enter Jodie Foster's first well-deserved Oscar for Sarah Tobias. She's partying, drinking and doping at a dive bar when a trio of bad men gang rape her, in the bar, in plain sight. Enter (should've also won an Oscar) Kelly McGillis as DA lawyer Kathryn Murphy who cares about winning a case against the rapists. Unfortunately for Sarah, this slam-dunk win would involve plea bargaining and lessens the meaning of justice and level of pain Sarah had to endure.In one of my all-time favorite scenes, and one that chokes me up each and every time I revisit this movie, Sarah confronts Kathryn in her home at Kathryn's high-class dinner party and lets her know she has no feelings. I just summed it up, without trying to spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it.But, it needed to be printed, because that's the main course of the film: Justice, and redemption, for Sarah, means getting ice-cold Kathryn to melt a little and fight harder for Sarah and any woman that never, ever deserves to be raped.Of course, the movie portrays Sarah as "a low life, trailer-trash, pot-smoking drunk," but never once…there's NEVER A MOMENT that I ever switch sides and feel she deserved it. I've been a juror twice – and an alternative once, and I know you have to listen to all the evidence first, but it would be extremely hard for me to not immediately make up my mind within the opening remarks.That all said, this is a powerful, interesting, emotionally driven and thought provoking film that should be seen by all. It's incredibly well shot and absolutely had Oscar-worthy performances by the two leads."You don't understand how I feel! I'm standing there with my pants down and my crotch hung out for the world to see and three guys are sticking it to me, a bunch of other guys are yelling and clapping and you're standing there telling me that that's the best you can do. Well, if that's the best you could do, then your best sucks! Now, I don't know what you got for selling me out, but I sure as sh|t hope it was worth it!" – Sarah Tobias.Tell me, she didn't deserve her 1st Oscar.

The female leading star deserved her (second) Oscar for playing the famous Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs, and I had always wanted to see the film that she won her first Oscar, because I heard about what it was about, and I definitely didn't miss out on it. Based on true events, the film opens at a bar, young woman Sarah Tobias (Oscar and Golden Globe winning, and BAFTA nominated Jodie Foster) is running out frantically, while a young man is calling from a telephone box on the opposite side of the road to call the police about an incident, and going to the nearest hospital she is covered in blood and severe bruises, she confirms that she was raped while other drunk spectators cheered it on. District attorney Kathryn Murphy (Top Gun's Kelly McGillis) is assigned to defend her in her case, and off-screen she is successful in putting the gang of rapists, but after this the case is dropped after a plea bargain is made with the guilty men, but this only angers the young woman. Sarah is enraged by this deal, and more specifically because she has not spoken to a court room with her witness statement, but, after a car accident involving one of the men who was cheering in the bar, the case is reignited to attempt the prosecution of the three men who were cheering and solicited the rape. Sarah's friend Sally Fraser (Ann Hearn) works as a waitress at the bar and gives her witness statement in court, that she was aware that a rape was going on but feared to intervene, but she confirms the identities of the men who were cheering it on Kurt (Kim Kondrashoff), Danny (Woody Brown) and Bob Joiner (Steve Antin), they have three attorneys to defend them. Sarah is then called in and questioned by Kathryn to give her personal recollection of the night where she was gang raped, describing in graphic detail what the men penetrating and restraining her and her being helpless to stop it or call for help, and of course recalling the men who cheered it all on. Then the key witness Kenneth 'Ken' Joyce (Bernie Coulson), the young man who called from the telephone box and a supposed friend of the accused men, is called to stand, and as he describes his version of events a flashback shows the entire night as it happened, from beginning to end (the point where the film opened), where Sarah was dressed rather provocatively, held down on the pinball machine, and one at a time raped by three or so men while those accused watched. The testimony from the defence is given to try and convince the jury to allow three "innocent" men to go free, but of course Kathryn fights hard to make it clear that what happened to Sarah cannot be called "nothing", do everything she can to convince them that the young woman was raped and that the men did indeed watch, laugh and encourage it to happen unwatched by the other bar occupants, and in the end the three men are all found guilty and not given parole, so Sarah and Kathryn happy justice is served. Also starring Leo Rossi as Cliff 'Scorpion' Albrect, Carmen Argenziano as D.A. Paul Rudolph, Tom O'Brien as Larry, Peter Van Norden as Attorney Paulsen and Terry David Mulligan as Lieutenant Duncan. McGillis is pretty good as the lawyer who is at first resilient but then determined to get to the bottom of the rape case and prove the truth, but of course the film is all about Foster who is absolutely superb as the young woman abused by both hideous sexual assault and the law system but comes through as a moving and equally determined victim. The story is well written, performed and paced, the court room scenes are as gripping as any I have seen before in other films of a similar standard, and the subject matter means that there are some disturbingly explicit hard to watch moments, but this all combined makes it a distinctive and compelling drama. Jodie Foster was number 23 on The 100 Greatest Movie Stars. Very good!