Just Cause (1995)

Today no one would dare to have a film with a black character actually being guilty. We have a cop that seems to be corrupt, but actually is just aware of things we know nothing about....and in the end political correctness causes trouble. Without saying too much its a movie well worth seeing. The reason this film is being graded down is simply white guilt liberals who hate having the truth rubbed in their face. the truth that they are out of touch elitists that know absolutely nothing. It was very predictable in the first half...just the way libtards like it. The predictable "bad cop" good innocent black guy" dynamic. Until the truth hits us in the face...you can't judge the book by its cover, and some black people know all too well how to play victim when it suits them. Spoilers; People are asking the stupidest things to try and prove this movie doesn't make sense ..like why is Bobby Earl what he is? For the same reason that ed Harris character is what he is. Why is he seeking revenge? HE was castrated due to Laurie. You don't think this is enough reason? The reason that the professor was so easy to fool? THE SAME REASON LIBERALS ARE ALWAYS EASUY TO FOOL; Because they don't want truth to interrupt their narrative of black people as victims, and white people and cops as bad guys, even though in the real world it is usually very much the opposite.

In rural Florida 1986, Bobby Earl (Blair Underwood) is arrested for the murder of a young white girl. Sheriff Tanny Brown (Laurence Fishburne) leads a group of brutal cops. Eight years later, Bobby is facing the electric chair. His mother pleads with law professor and anti-death penalty advocate Paul Armstrong (Sean Connery) to help. His wife (Kate Capshaw) pushes him to take on the case. Imprisoned serial killer Blair Sullivan (Ed Harris) claims to have committed the crime.The acting is way too broad especially Fishburne. Sean Connery is possibly the most subtle of the lot which says everything. The movie is so heavy-handed. It pushes so hard that it's obvious something is wrong with the narrative. The twists are not obvious but expected. The movie moves too slowly wading through the case like a swamp. I don't know why the cops tell Armstrong so many incriminating statements. The Sullivan confession has an explanation which makes a new trial unlikely. The movie just doesn't have any tension with so much overacting. This is also notable that a young Scarlett Johansson has a minor role.

Sean Connery plays a Liberal Harvard college professor who is also a staunch anti-capital punishment advocate. Based on his reputation, he is called upon to help a young black man(played by Blair Underwood) who was said to be wrongly convicted of the brutal murder of a young girl. At first, the professor feels pretty self-satisfied of the innocence of Underwood, and gets him released, though the investigating police officers insist he was guilty. Things then take a dark turn as the good professor learns a hard lesson himself...Solid thriller has good acting by all, and efficient direction, but it is the surprising story turns that really make this stand out, and it is good to see a Hollywood film not take the obvious,(and easy) way out in regards to the controversial subject matter, which lead to an exciting and satisfying end.

To fight against the death penalty is a just cause. Everyone who is sane in Europe would think so. In the USA everything is different. The film seems to demonstrate in a first stage that justice can be won against the racist bigot death penalty craving American justice. A young man is freed from death row thanks to a law professor who went back to defense counseling for this particular case. But the film has a sequel. Justice in the USA is entirely governed by the aim of vengeance. Miscarriage of justice is just the same governed by vengeance. One person in the local Public Attorney Offfice has a young man prosecuted on false charges. This Public Attorney's officer drops the charges after a while and the young man walks out free. But he loses his college scholarship and he is castrated by some vengeful people for whom there is never any smoke without a fire. He hides his shame and swears to get his vengeance. But he also needs to satisfy his sexual needs which are more mental than hormonal for sure but even stronger because mental and no longer hormonal and he can only do that with little girls. He apparently teams with another serial killer who is after the same kind of preys. One day the local cops follow their intuition, guided by some vague circumstantial elements in the assassination of a young girl, and they arrest the young chap we are speaking of. They beat him up and interrogate him for 22 hours with nothing but blows and blows and telephone books and guns and Russian roulette. He confesses. Sent to death row, he asks his grandmother to go get the law professor in Massachusetts who is the husband of the Local Public Attorney's representative that had him falsely prosecuted some years ago and the vengeance is on the rails. It will fail but it shows that as soon as one in the line of justice, police work and other security forces steps off the line of absolute legality, some unjust act is done that can ruin even the best accusation case and that can nourish the worst deepest imaginable thirst for vengeance. To charge someone on circumstantial elements is just as bad as to let circumstantial elements ruin the work of the police or of justice. The best intentions on the police side are ruined by some personal involvement and vengeful intention, just as much as the life of a person can be jeopardized by circumstantial elements inflated to the size of evidence, which in its turn will jeopardize the whole case by being just circumstantial, hence easily discardable, with a good lawyer. The film then is a deep reflection on the necessity to respect standards and regulations all along the police and justice line if we don't want to make a mistake, which in its turn of course does not justify the death penalty since anyway it goes against the deepest belief Americans are supposed to have: "We hold these truths to be self-evident , that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." (Declaration of Independence) Life is an unalienable Right that was given to man by his Creator, which means no one but the one who gave it can take it away. Only God can take the life of a person away. The death penalty is the arrogant appropriation of a power that we do not have. Even if we do not evoke God, we cannot justify the death penalty except as an act of vengeance, and here the film shows vengeance is the worst possible motivation in the rendition of justice and in the establishment of public peace. If vengeance is pushed aside there is no other justification for this death penalty. And there can always be a mistake in that pursuit not of Happiness but of vengeance.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID