Political Football

Some odd stuff in Peter Debruge's Variety review of Brian Banks, a fictionalized account of a real life college football player who was falsely accused of rape. Debruge notes the "timing could hardly be worse." Why?  As he goes on to say:

Is this the movie the world needs now, one that casts doubt on survivor testimony and feeds a misogynistic culture's fear that "good" men can have their lives destroyed by such accusations...?

Hmm.  Does it really cast doubt on "survivor testimony," or rather does it say that no matter who speaks, their testimony should be judged impartially based on the evidence.  It's also sad that Debruge feels safe, perhaps even self-righteous, in asserting--in passing, mind you--that our whole culture is misogynistic.  And why put "good" in quotation marks--we aren't afraid that actual good men can have their lives destroyed by false accusations? (And bad men too, while we're at it.)

Later, Debruge admits the film isn't quite that bad (so why the pointless preamble?), and notes the film

is by no means an apologia for sexual aggression, and no one would mistake it as such.  If anything, this true story of an isolated case illustrates how infinitely complicated the issue of rape can be, demonstrating how systemic problems--most notably race- and class-based prejudices--result in someone like Banks being treated differently from people of privilege.

First, since the film is about a false accusation, why would anyone think it's making excuses for sexual aggression?

Second, Debruge hastens to note it's an "isolated case." The film may only deal with one case, but that doesn't mean there aren't thousands of others. (Elsewhere in the review, Debruge suddenly cares about numbers, citing an advocacy group's statistics to demonstrate there's a lot of sexual assault that doesn't end up in incarceration--this has nothing to do with the film at hand, but apparently shows Debruge isn't on the wrong side of an issue.)

Third, Debruge brings in race and class which, apparently, gets him back into his comfort zone.  It's true, race and class are factors in the justice system.  But guess what?  Even privileged men can be falsely accused of crimes, and that's wrong, too.

I would hope most of us can agree we shouldn't trample over our society's liberal (or at least what used to be considered liberal) principles.  Which is why it's always timely to tell a story like this.  If anything, it's arguably more timely during the rise of the #MeToo movement, when society, in its zeal to right wrongs, has to be careful to make sure it's paying enough attention to due process.