I have a little problem buying the Sheriff and his deputy as heroes, when instead of doing police work, they got their confession through beatings and putting a gun to the suspect's head. That kind of crap often gets innocent people to confess to stuff they did not do. This story points to how a corrupt system creates criminals. But in the end, we are told to respect that system.
shareI think it more shows that while cops who do this shouldn't do it (not only because it is morally wrong but because it can end up hurting the case), it doesn't necessarily mean that the suspect is not guilty and that they should get off because of it. The only time I ever looked at Fishburne as a hero and respected him was when he tried to help save Connery's family, but even then his past actions discounted those feelings.
shareWel, yeah. Tanny felt powerless I think.. he KNEW the guy did it, yet he couldn't prove it. That, and the fact the victim was a close friend probably made him snap.
OR it never happened, as he and the deputy never really confessed doing it ('we hit him once or twice') and it was made up by Bob to get sympathy. According to Bob, Tanny was also a *beep* hater, well I don't see anything of that back in the movie.
He's shown as a way different person in the flashbacks, a kind of sadist. And Bob on the other hand, is shown as an innocent and frightened kid in the flashbacks, while he was a psycho for a long time already.
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I do not see that Tanny and Wilcox are good guys. In fact, they are a shame and disgrace to their profession. The fact that the man they torture coincidentally happens to be guilty does not excuse their methods.
I feel this is one of the good points of the movie. It's not as simple as "these are the good guys and those are the bad guys". No, the seemingly good guy turns out to be bad but this does not make the bad guys good.
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After seeing the planning and mental state of Bobby Earl, I have reason to believe he made the entire thing up about the "forced confession".
He used Tanny's passion for wanting to find the suspect against him, but again, the flashbacks could all just be the story Bobby Earl WANTS to be true to manipulate Armstrong.
Good point, it could've been a lie for Armstrong to buy into his lie and feel sympathy for him.
"I am the ultimate badass, you do not wanna `*beep*` wit me!"- Hudson in Aliens.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Tecun Uman, we're all so righteous to sit back and criticize things that we think don't work, when in fact it's because of our own attitudes and behaviours that systems don't work. We blame the government, but it's our own fault. We blame the courts, but it's our own fault. Here's an idea: how about if everyone who committed a crime turned himself in, confessed to what he did, and accepted the punishment? Then there would be no need for coercive police behaviour, opportunistic lawyers, and vindictive prosecutors. We support crime, by and large, by what we do or don't do. We demand that the police deal with it. We offer them little or no support. We criticize them whenever they step near or over the boundaries. Get the picture? If we had respected the system from the start, we would not have to respect it with its present state of corruption.
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