MovieChat Forums > A Time to Kill (1996) Discussion > ‘Now imagine she’s white’

‘Now imagine she’s white’

posted 2 years ago by Chester (223)
8 replies | jump to latest

Very weird line. If I was in the jury I’d be thinking ‘yeah… OK. Makes no difference 🤷🏻‍♂️’ and then I’d be pissed off that the lawyer smugly assumed that I would care about the skin colour of the girl in question. I’d be very inclined to vote ‘guilty’ just based on the patronising manipulation attempt and insulting presumption that I was a racist.

If a juror was a racist, they’d no doubt feel even more hostile to the lawyer for pulling that trick.

Also, is that supposed to convince the jury that SLJ was temporarily insane when he committed the murders? It looked to me that it simply made a case for vigilante justice, which wasn’t the original plea.

I’m no lawyer, but unlike A Few Good Men, this seemed pretty weak sauce as a legal drama. Can a lawyer leapfrog over the plea and ‘touch the hearts’ of the jury and get an ‘innocent’ verdict on a revenge double murder?

Surely the correct outcome for a crime like this is something like 10 years in prison - two life sentences severely reduced by the extenuating circumstances of the fact the two men raped and nearly killed the guy’s 10 year old daughter?

Courtroom dramas need to be intelligent, this film felt dumb and emotionally manipulative. It’s competently directed, well acted by an all star cast and entertaining enough, but it felt like Leftist agitprop for low IQ audiences. The filmmakers weren’t exploring an idea, they were preaching.

Also, how cheesy was the scene where the wife floats into his office to tell him she thought he was all about fame (this aspect of his character was never established) but inexplicably had a change of heart and realised he was trying to do the right thing all along? Almost as cliche as Don Sutherland telling him he can’t step into a courtroom again… only to do exactly that during his big final speech. Come on Schumacher, you’re better than this 🤦🏻‍♂️

I’d be interested if any legal minds here can comment on the credibility of the legal stuff in this film. Are my suspicions that this is Hollywood guff accurate?

[–] Kowalski (78804) 2 years ago

🤣

[–] Chester (223) 2 years ago

Yeah it was pretty funny, especially the portrayal of the redneck rapists - it was like watching a Leftist’s wet dream of what Southerners are like 🤣

As if white on black rape is commonplace in the modern world, when the reverse is the norm, and the sad reality is endless iterations of this: https://twitter.com/HighImpactFlix/status/1626721626115960834?s=20

[–] Kowalski (78804) 2 years ago

🤣

[–] MovieChatUser497 (18943) 2 years ago

All McCanaughay (I know I misspelled his name and I don't care) had to say was "imagine she's your daughter", but no he had to use white guilt to get a man who knowingly murdered two people in handcuffs off. I realize what those two thugs did was unforgivable and evil but when the system starts allowing citizens to just gun people down with no consequences that is opening a pandora's box that could have serious ramifications.

[–] JFZ (1459) a year ago

The prosecutor should have said have made the same statement for the liberal audience. Now imagine if the rapists were black and Carl Lee Hailey was white. The fumes from the seething would be palpable.

[–] Ranb (11244) 8 months ago

In the book it was a juror who made that statement while deliberating after the defense rested. In the book, Brigance did not play the race card as blatantly as was done in the film. But the book was even more racially charged than the film.

In the book Brigance was an attention whore and loved to have his name in the press. He was not wealthy and lived from client to client.

[–] Tam87 (1589) 8 months ago

The irony of this line is that the real life story (that this film is based on) was about a black man raping two young white girls.

[–] Foster1486 (633) 6 months ago

Hahahahahahaha

Yeah -- because by the mid 90s the south wasn't like that --- Hahahahahahaha