Wednesday Minute
No. 202 | December 29, 2010

It’s Kind of a True Story

Our theme this week
Recent movies based on stories of real people

Featured this week (theme introduction)
Monday         —   The Social Network:  Mark Zuckerberg
Tuesday         —   Nowhere Boy:  John Lennon

Conviction:  Betty Anne Waters

Not all “true” stories are based on lives of the famous.  Here’s a film with people you likely would not know about otherwise.

Conviction tells the tale of a sister and brother living in a small town in northeast Massachusetts.  Betty Anne Waters (Hilary Swank) is a high school dropout with two sons and no job.  In 1983 Kenny Waters (Sam Rockwell) is arrested for a murder that occurred a few years before.  He is found guilty, but Betty Anne believes that her brother has been wrongfully convicted.  She promises to fight until she wins his release.

That fight would ultimately take eighteen years, during which she put herself through college and law school, worked part-time to pay bills, and raised a family.  Finally a lawyer, Betty Anne enlists help from Barry Shenk of the Innocence Project, and through a combination of persistence and luck, they win justice for Kenny.

The film is more a drama about family and faith than a legal thriller.  For Swank, it’s a part not far from her two Oscar-winning roles, a working-class heroine who refuses to quit.  Rockwell shines as the incorrigible bad boy who suffers for the sins of a corrupt justice system.  Among the top-rate work turned in by a fine cast is Melissa Leo as the hostile cop who put Kenny away and Juliette Lewis in a small but knockout performance as the witness who testified against her ex-lover Kenny. 

This isn’t a big film and won’t win a big audience, but it’s a story that should be known.  Equal treatment under the law is an ideal, and unfortunately not the universal practice.  For many, especially on the lower end of the economic ladder, there’s scant hope for the justice that should be a birthright for all of us.

One sad note, not covered in the film.  Kenny, finally free after almost two decades in prison, died in an accidental fall just six months after his release.  He did at least live to see himself exonerated, and for Betty Anne, her story remains an inspiration.  She continues to work as a lawyer for prisoners’ rights.

---

Conviction (2010)
Tony Goldwyn, director
Pamela Gray, sceenplay
Adriano Goldman, cinematographer
Trailer

---

Quote of note
“I’m going to start by trying to get a B.A….after I finally take the stupid G.E.D. test, and after that I’ll apply to law school, but you just have to promise me that you’ll never give up.”
—-Betty Anne Waters (Hilary Swank), Conviction (2010)

…58…59…60.

1. Charlotte Donnelly says:

   December 20, 2011 at 8:26 am

   I sign into my Tumblr account, and switch the dashboard from my main blog to the secondary blog, then I go to Account > Preferences > Customize your blog, but then it just takes me to the customization page for my main blog. Any way to customize my secondary blog, or should I just create a second account altogether?.
2. Arron Earp says:

   March 22, 2012 at 10:11 am

   Amazing! This blog looks exactly like my old one! It’s on a entirely different subject but it has pretty much the same layout and design. Outstanding choice of colors!