The Accused (1988)

The Accused lands in 1988 with a subject the marketplace had no appetite for. Sarah Tobias, a waitress, is gang raped on a pinball machine in a bar while patrons cheer, and the film refuses to look away from the aftermath. Jodie Foster plays her without a shred of vanity. Kelly McGillis plays the assistant district attorney who plea-bargains the rapists down to reckless endangerment because she doubts the victim will survive cross-examination. The picture's true subject is the accounting a culture performs on women: who is credible, who was asking for it, whose body counts as evidence. Paramount's own test screenings recorded the lowest scores in studio history. A second screening, women only, produced some of the highest. That anecdote is the film in miniature.

The feminist argument here is structural, not decorative. Sarah wants her day in court, and the plot bends toward giving her one, which in 1988 was a genuine advance. The film has nothing to say about race, nothing about climate, nothing about wealth as a system, and no interest in body acceptance or neurodivergence. Its leads are two women, notable casting for the era, though the decision was driven by bankability and the rest of the ensemble is white men. Sherry Lansing and Stanley Jaffe pursued Foster only after Kim Basinger, Demi Moore, and Rosanna Arquette declined the part.

Where the film grows wearying is in its instruction. Roger Ebert drew the intended lesson: verbal harassment is a form of violence. The closing card supplies rape statistics, just in case the preceding ninety minutes were ambiguous. The sermon is worth hearing, and the film delivers it with craft, but it does deliver it. A viewer leaves educated. That is a compliment and a limitation, and this sommelier notes both.