Movies about Criminal Justice System - Essay Example

Movies about Criminal Justice System Introduction Film tries to depict events and systems in our societies. Script writers seek to present situations as they happen or as they would happen. As such factual movies, based on reality, present realities or mistakes in perception of such realities. Many movies have thus been created on these subjects and have brought much information about facts or mistakes made to the attention of many people. One of such realities with different perceptions is the criminal law system. With a great influence in every individual, the criminal justice system is viewed as the most accurate and flawless system where only facts through logic are presented with fairness in judgment. However, in many cases, this has not been the scenario. In this regard, this paper presents two movies, which include the Law Abiding Citizen and A few Good Men, and their perspectives of the criminal justice system. The law abiding citizen This movie is based on disputes that occur in the criminal justice system. In instances where justice seems to be evasive for victims, there are no provisions for attainment of truth and in most cases, the victims end up losing on just grounds. The movie stars Gerald Butler, as a vigilante seeking justice for the murder of his family and Jamie Fox as a prosecutor for the repentant. The plot begins with a bad scenario where Butler’s family gets murdered in his presence. On notification, the police arrive and arrest both the killer and the accomplice. The arrested are later taken to court for legal examination of injustice and thus conviction. However, things take a different turn when the suspects are taken into the criminal justice system. The murder testifies against his innocent accomplice and gets sentenced for only three years to serve as jail term. Upon realization, Butler feels denied of his rightful justice and sets to seek justice on his own. In the unfolding events, he avenges his family by tracking down the murderers, kills them through a horrendous approach alter seeks to show the prosecution panel that just denied is not stolen. Thus in the process, he avenges through killing the culprits as a means of earning his denied justice. Perceptual views Legal analysts believe that movies serve more purposes than just the entertainment part. They believe that contents presented in popular culture hold much significance than actually represented. They are therefore based on reality. In this respect, the movie portrays the criminal justice system as a failed system with provision of injustice to victims in dire need. As the case of Butler, the movie portrays lack of logic and thus truth in serving as a justice deliverance platform. When the murderer gets a short sentence from the court, the victim whose whole family was murdered for no reasons such as self defense or provocation feels highly unsatisfied. Instead of delivering fairness to the situation, the criminal justice system fails as a form of dispute resolution. Secondly, criminal systems were set to as places where people would resolve their disputes and thus is out to be unbiased and extremely fair. That upon deliverance of justice, every party should feel contented when the system proves beyond doubt that the best judgment has been provided. However, this is not the situation in the movie. Butler, through feelings of anger, gets the first thought of avenging upon seeing his family getting murdered. However, he awaits court ruling to get his dispute resolved in the court system whereby it rules in favor of the main criminal despite his testimony. This turns out to be helpless in his situation. When the criminal gets served with a short sentence, he seeks another platform for dispute resolutions; a cruel avenging one. He thus comes back to hunt for the culprits and kills them in painful deaths, one by one until he is done with most of them. When the systems finds out that he is behind the killings, a reversed hunt begins and this scenario brings light on the law enforcement. Under the United States law, the law enforcement department of the criminal justice system should follow those hunted by justice seekers. In this case, the enforcers, who previously fulfilled their roles in arresting and taking the criminals to court begin another hunt for Butler; this time around for committing crimes of murder. Enforcement is depicted weak in hunting for criminals. While all the other accomplices ran away and the law enforcement failed catch up with them and prove beyond doubt that they are the real criminals. According to ------- this is another flaw in the criminal justice system. The other aspect presented is the use of faulty lawyers. While the criminal is guilty of the charges laid beforehand, the repentant prosecutor brings flaws into the scenario. While not clearly indicating reasons for totally defending the criminal, the prosecutor makes use of his position to defend the criminal and eventually succeeds. Through this, the movie depicts that there are serious faults within the criminal justice system which lawyers and prosecutors take advantage of to mitigate felony cases to misdemeanors. A few good men This is another movie based on the criminal justice system. Being a drama based on military content, the movie explores would be situations of criminal justice. There occurs a murder of military soldier, apparently killed by fellow military men. Playing at a leading role, Tom Cruise is allocated the responsibility of defending the two accused officer. In his role, he prefers alternative dispute resolution to courtroom resolutions. As a matter of fact, the case gets complicated when evidence collection starts to reveal that there is more hidden information about it than the one that has been presented. Upon realization that the killing of sergeant was planned and organized within the military itself, the assigned defendants get more information relevant for the prosecution of the criminals. However, proving this in a court of law becomes an insurmountable task which challenges the way cases are presented in a criminal justice system. Views of the system from the movie The movie depicts the criminal court system as rigid and totally un-accepting. Given that the defendant has uncovered useful information for the prosecution of appropriate criminals, the system denies him a right to present this information for helping with the justice process. Given his role of a defendant, the court cannot give him credibility for evidence collected that uncovers who the real murderers are. This way, the court room is portrayed as totally unfair and unjust. Secondly, the movie shows that instead of the criminal and defense systems serving as only mirrors, reflecting their purposes in total purity, they are also places of organized crime thus tainting their own images. Transparency of the systems thus is presented as illusionary to conventional belief. In most cases, the criminal court systems fail to keep up to their expectations and thus fail to keep the trust of the society in them. Showing how organized and concealing such systems can be, trust in them is diminished and thus reflection of the systems as sources of justice becomes absent. This is a great factor in the movie. Thirdly, the movie implicates difficulties using the law enforcement department and defense agencies for collection of evidence and defense of suspects. Given that criminal justice systems implicate law enforcement agencies for collection and presentation of evidence before the courts, inability to show how relevant the law enforcement agency is and their role in the movie is an indication of inefficiency of the agency and thus a great weakness in the criminal justice system. Also the assignment of another military for purposes of defense of suspected murderers of fellow military man indicates inability of the system to trust legal experts in defense of suspected individuals. This, in collaboration with weaknesses presented above on the law enforcement agency, creates tremendous flaws within the system and jeopardizes its credibility. Conclusion It is highly evident from the discussion that movies play a crucial role in entertainment and presentation of scenarios of great societal interest. From analysts view, popular cultures such as movies place misplaced perceptions of realities in the eyes of the society so that these flaws can be seen. As evident from the two movies above, the criminal court system is not entirely effective and fair in execution of justice. In the movies the law abiding citizen, based on the criminal justice system and instances where justice seems to be evasive for victims, the system fails to be a platform for resolution. Instead of delivering fairness to the situation, the criminal justice system fails as a form of dispute resolution and the star seeks his own means of arriving at justice, ineffective law enforcement agencies, legal experts taking advantage of flaws within the system. In the second movie, the movie depicts the criminal court system as rigid and totally un-accepting since the court cannot give credibility for evidence collected by the defendant. It also shows criminal court systems as places of organized crime thus tainting their own images. Lastly, the system has problems using the law enforcement department and defense agencies for collection of evidence and defense of suspects. Works Cited Retrieved from http://lawmovies.wordpress.com/2011/01/23/a-few-good-men-1992/. Retrieved on 5th April, 2012 Retrieved from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1197624/. Retrieved on 5th April, 2012 Retrieved from http://www.filmschoolrejects.com/news/law-abiding-citizen-poster-rruin.php. Retrieved on 5th April, 2012 Read More