The Accused
Best known today as the original Special Agent Clarice Starling, Jodie Foster has had a stronghold on the drama genre since her performance as Iris in Taxi Driver. However, too often forgotten is the subject of her first Academy Award, the role of Sarah Tobias in “The Accused.” Quite a different role from the law-abiding, success driven Clarice, this film provides a realistic view into the lives of those in a disadvantaged white neighborhood and sets the high water mark for movies like it that would follow, for example, the recent “North Country”.
Sarah is a gang rape victim who does not get to tell her story because Deputy District Attorney Kathryn Murphy believes that her character is “questionable”. After Murphy feels the pains of guilt for not letting the victim tell her story, she decides to prosecute the men who cheered on the three rapists. What we are left with is a performance like no other.
Throughout the duration of the story, the audience sees small superficial changes that Sarah goes through as she cuts her hair and kicks her good-for-nothing boyfriend out of the house, but we see very little character development. Although she is the center story, her self-effacing character is overshadowed by the brash Kathryn. Sarah continues to drink and lose her temper at inappropriate times, making scenes when she should be trying to keep a low profile. In the beginning, excluding the first scene, she is whispering and sees herself as merely a victim of everything that happens. She is a victim of rape. She is a victim of the prosecution when she must remain silent. She is a victim of an all-but-estranged relationship with a mother who hears from Sarah only when she is in need of something. As the movie progresses, her self-esteem stays low but she begins to find the voice that was once just a whisper.
Herein lays the irony, though. It is not when Sarah finally gets to let her voice be heard that her high key performance finally kicks in. She takes the stand and tells her story, crying, to the DA and breaks down upon cross examination when the Defense Attorney pokes more holes in her story than in a college dorm room wall. Foster keeps Sarah’s attitude in check and keeps it low key, because she knows that she is no saint and is ashamed to have to admit it. In fact, apart from the first scene where Foster runs out of the bar screaming mere moments after having been raped, the entire performance is low key, even when she is acting out. The audience almost feels like Sarah is so self-conscious that only when she loses her temper does she feel that she is entitled to any respect.
That is, until Kenny Joyce takes the stand. As Kenny gives his eyewitness account of the rape which he saw his best friend perform, the scene flashes back to the night and the actual gang-rape and the audience gets to finally see the real Sarah. She is trashy and vulgar, drinking too much and acting loosely, flirting and throwing her sexuality into the faces of her accused. Her shirt sleeves fall down, barely exposing her breast. She is drunk and has lost all inhibitions, until the first attacker starts to get too frisky. When she tries to stop him, she is held down and gang raped in one of the most brutal scenes ever put on film and her performance kicks into high gear as the incident takes place. The close up shots of her face as her mouth is being pressed down on with such force she can hardly speak show the combination of agony and fear that Sarah is experiencing. Her eyes, wide and full of tears, convey a thousand times more emotion than simply telling her story ever could. The realistic style in which Sarah tries to fight off three men (who are so much bigger than she) puts the viewer in the room, and all the while, the other men are screaming and dancing around and urging other men to rape her too. The cacophony of sound blends together to make the scene a horror to watch, and it is in this scene that Foster perfects the role and nabs the Oscar.
Although Foster had been in many productions before this and had been nominated for another Academy Award twelve years prior, this was the role in which she became well known. Still three years away from icon status, which she achieved after her performance in The Silence of the Lambs, she allowed her talent to set a precedent that few people dare to exceed. Taking the script and making it hers, all the while being careful not to overact or drown out the other characters is how Foster shows her peers the meaning of versatility with humility.
Sarah is a gang rape victim who does not get to tell her story because Deputy District Attorney Kathryn Murphy believes that her character is “questionable”. After Murphy feels the pains of guilt for not letting the victim tell her story, she decides to prosecute the men who cheered on the three rapists. What we are left with is a performance like no other.
Throughout the duration of the story, the audience sees small superficial changes that Sarah goes through as she cuts her hair and kicks her good-for-nothing boyfriend out of the house, but we see very little character development. Although she is the center story, her self-effacing character is overshadowed by the brash Kathryn. Sarah continues to drink and lose her temper at inappropriate times, making scenes when she should be trying to keep a low profile. In the beginning, excluding the first scene, she is whispering and sees herself as merely a victim of everything that happens. She is a victim of rape. She is a victim of the prosecution when she must remain silent. She is a victim of an all-but-estranged relationship with a mother who hears from Sarah only when she is in need of something. As the movie progresses, her self-esteem stays low but she begins to find the voice that was once just a whisper.
Herein lays the irony, though. It is not when Sarah finally gets to let her voice be heard that her high key performance finally kicks in. She takes the stand and tells her story, crying, to the DA and breaks down upon cross examination when the Defense Attorney pokes more holes in her story than in a college dorm room wall. Foster keeps Sarah’s attitude in check and keeps it low key, because she knows that she is no saint and is ashamed to have to admit it. In fact, apart from the first scene where Foster runs out of the bar screaming mere moments after having been raped, the entire performance is low key, even when she is acting out. The audience almost feels like Sarah is so self-conscious that only when she loses her temper does she feel that she is entitled to any respect.
That is, until Kenny Joyce takes the stand. As Kenny gives his eyewitness account of the rape which he saw his best friend perform, the scene flashes back to the night and the actual gang-rape and the audience gets to finally see the real Sarah. She is trashy and vulgar, drinking too much and acting loosely, flirting and throwing her sexuality into the faces of her accused. Her shirt sleeves fall down, barely exposing her breast. She is drunk and has lost all inhibitions, until the first attacker starts to get too frisky. When she tries to stop him, she is held down and gang raped in one of the most brutal scenes ever put on film and her performance kicks into high gear as the incident takes place. The close up shots of her face as her mouth is being pressed down on with such force she can hardly speak show the combination of agony and fear that Sarah is experiencing. Her eyes, wide and full of tears, convey a thousand times more emotion than simply telling her story ever could. The realistic style in which Sarah tries to fight off three men (who are so much bigger than she) puts the viewer in the room, and all the while, the other men are screaming and dancing around and urging other men to rape her too. The cacophony of sound blends together to make the scene a horror to watch, and it is in this scene that Foster perfects the role and nabs the Oscar.
Although Foster had been in many productions before this and had been nominated for another Academy Award twelve years prior, this was the role in which she became well known. Still three years away from icon status, which she achieved after her performance in The Silence of the Lambs, she allowed her talent to set a precedent that few people dare to exceed. Taking the script and making it hers, all the while being careful not to overact or drown out the other characters is how Foster shows her peers the meaning of versatility with humility.
posted by Susan at
3/24/2006
1 Comments:
I remember seeing The Accused at a theater in Fredericksburg, VA. That rape scene was too intense for me, and I left the theater; I asked an usher to let me know when the scene was over. I didn't want to enter the theater until the coast was clear. He told me I wasn't the first person to leave during that scene, and that he saw grown men crying as they left.
Jodie was awesome in that movie. She really went out on a limb and took huge risks with the character.
But now, she suc-diddly-ucks. Icy and impenetrable. She no longer reaches me as an actor. She should stick to directing and producing.
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Vickie, at 9:58 PM
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