Releases in the United Kingdom in November Prima Facie, a dramatic film based on a 2019 award-winning Australian play by Suzie Miller, directed for the cinema by Susanna White (also published as a novel by Neri Pozza), and starring the extraordinary Cynthia Erivo in a role that could not be more distant from the fantastical character she portrays in Wicked. Prima Facie, which literally means “the first impression,” tackles a tragically timely theme—the violence against women—from an unprecedented vantage point, that of a lawyer who has always defended those women, and who herself becomes a victim and is almost forced to justify in court the rape she suffered. It seems that, unfortunately, little to nothing has changed in this regard since the historic 1979 documentary Rape Trial, where victims were accused in court and their words were doubted, often with mockery, in favor of the perpetrators. In the meantime, this is the film’s official trailer.
Prima Facie and the Unheard No from a Victim
Prima Facie tells the story of Tessa (Cynthia Erivo), a brilliant and ambitious defense attorney, raised in a family of modest origins. Determined to carve a path in a male‑dominated world, she has built her career with intelligence, rigor, and an extraordinary rhetorical ability. In court, she defends even the most challenging clients with skill, including those accused of sexual crimes, convinced that everyone deserves effective legal representation. But when she is raped by a colleague, her world collapses. For the first time, Tessa finds herself on the other side of the justice system, and she discovers with brutal clarity how the law, which she had always served with discipline and trust, can prove blind, distant, and unable to protect those who have suffered violence. Prima Facie is the intense portrait of a woman torn between what she has always believed and the reality of a justice that, precisely at the most critical moments, cannot be just. A story of trauma, awakening, and transformation, that lays bare the deep contradictions of the legal system.
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