Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		0.5
Overall		3.0

The Accused Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman August 2, 2022

The Accused is a very good film, but it is also a difficult film to watch. It deals with intense subject matter and a broad spectrum of human emotion and human depravity. It is unflinchingly raw in both areas, and it is built for both narrative authenticity and dramatic and cinematic impact. The film, from Director Jonathan Kaplan (Unlawful Entry) and Writer Tom Topor (Nuts), is a visceral experience, an edge-of-the-seat film not because of its tension but because of its gripping rawness and roughness. Yet the film is elegantly crafted and acted, a deadly combination that garnered the film widespread acclaim and box office success despite its unpalatable core story mechanics.

A woman runs from a bar, clutching her shirt to her chest, screaming in agony, trying to flag down traffic. A man calls the cops. The woman, Sarah Tobias (Jodie Foster), has been raped. Soon after a medical check-up and check-in with the police, she, with the police and the deputy district attorney Kathryn Murphy (Kelly McGillis) in tow, returns to the scene of the crime and identifies her attackers, who are still lounging at the bar. What follows is a complex series of legal maneuvers that end with a deal rather than a trial, infuriating Sarah who demands real justice. Murphy, learning that there was not only a rape but also a cheering section encouraging it, chooses to go after the secondarily guilty in a high stakes legal game that threatens to redefine rape and expose the truth of Sarah’s experience that night in the bar.

The film blends narrative engagement with complex legal scenarios, and it does so nearly to an art. The balance between the visceral human condition components and the legal maneuverings make for a compelling, full portrait picture that details the arduous process of revealing truth and finding justice. The film expertly balances these components into a single living organism in the best tradition of the finest courtroom films, but rather than the external legal maneuverings it is the internal scarring and pain and the deterioration of the whole human condition on both sides of the rape where the film truly shines. It's expertly layered yet incredibly purposeful on the whole, leading to one of the best films of 1988 and one that deserved more awards season buzz than the lone Oscar nomination (and win) it received.

The Accused went through an arduous casting process that saw several big names attached to, and eventually made distant from, the project for its exceedingly complex take on humanity and the grit and rawness that is necessary for an actor to inhabit a character such as Sarah Tobias. The role eventually went to Jodie Foster. Kelly McGillis, of Top Gun fame, was offered the role but turned it down due to her own rape experience. She, of course, was given, and accepted, the role of the assistant district attorney in the film. McGillis is solid in her part -- she is tough in the part, she looks the part, and she sounds the part -- but it is Foster who absolutely steals the show. She plays Sarah with an incredibly deep and vivid, lived-in depth that finds a range of emotional upheaval and character uncertainty throughout the film. It's a dark and deep and daring performance that earned her the first (of two) Academy Award wins. The film is credited with resurrecting Jodie Foster's then-stagnant career which had been interrupted by her high-profile connection to the 1981 assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan following Foster's work in Taxi Driver and the would-be assassin's obsession with her and her character.

The Accused Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Paramount's 1080p Blu-ray presentation of The Accused is very good. There is some evident telecine wobble during the opening titles and the title letters display jagged edges. Fortunately, beyond a few more fleeting examples of jagged edges here and there, that opening represents the beginning and the end of any truly bothersome issues with the image. Once beyond that the picture looks very good. Grain is naturally present and filmic, helping to create a healthy, satisfying film-like appearance. Textural definition is very good as well. Faces and clothes come alive with commanding clarity, revealing complex components with remarkable ease and efficiency. Facial close-ups are amongst the highlights, but clothes and various environments, from a barroom to a courtroom, look wonderfully complex and natural. Colors are well saturated. There is no problem in terms of color pop and depth. Everything is dialed in just right for contrast and temperature. Black levels are solid if not slightly prone to favor crush a few times. Whites are suitably crisp. Skin tones are healthy. There are some very minor examples of print wear and speckling, but these are never distracting. There are no obvious encode issues to report. This is a very healthy and a very satisfying catalogue Blu-ray release from Paramount.

The Accused Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Paramount brings The Accused to Blu-ray with a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. The presentation rarely takes advantage of the surround speakers, at least not in any meaningful or even, usually, just evident way. The front end carries the majority of the content, with the center channel handling the bulk of those duties. While music spaces nicely enough along the front, boasting good foundational clarity and separation, it is the center that gets most of the action. This is a dialogue intensive film. The spoken word is clear, natural, and lifelike with flawless prioritization in evidence throughout. Beyond that, the track offers good little examples of ambient fill flowing through office spaces and city exteriors (the 55-minute mark offers both). Again, such sound elements present with a very heavy front side focus, but also with impressive front side width, at least making a larger environment through which the support sounds operate. There's nothing too terribly unique, flavorful, or even distinguishing about this track, but the 5.1 lossless presentation handles core duties admirably. Listeners should be more than satisfied with this transmission of the original sound design.

The Accused Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This Blu-ray release of The Accused contains only a single extra: the film's Theatrical Trailer (480i, 2:10). No DVD or digital copies are included with purchase. This release does not ship with a slipcover. Aside from the trailer and the presence of a main menu screen with four selectable options (Play, Settings, Scenes, Extra), this one is pretty well bare bones.

The Accused Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

This is an excellent picture that brings together thrilling legal depth and raw human content in a way that few other kinds of the courtroom genre manage. Foster is special in the role and McGillis is rock solid, too, in what might be her best performance. Paramount's Blu-ray is sadly devoid of bonus content beyond a standard definition trailer. However, the video and audio presentations are very good. Recommended.