Interesting Strategy
How does he keep his head up straight with the sheer weight of that brass neck to support?
In what can be described as a ballsy move, Oscar-winning director Roman Polanski has filed a lawsuit against the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, AMPAS, who basically are the Oscars.
He’s suing Oscar.
A lawsuit filed by the director in Los Angeles alleges that AMPAS did not follow proper protocol in dismissing him over a historical charge of sex with a minor, and broke their own guidelines.
Suspension or expulsion from the group requires two-thirds approval of the 54-member board of governors.
The current board includes Spider-Man 2 actor Alfred Molina, Men In Black Casting Director David Rubin and The Night Manager Director Susanna Bier. Whoopi Goldberg and Laura Dern are also representatives.
At the time of his expulsion, the Academy said it was:
“in accordance with the organization’s Standards of Conduct”.
However, Polanski’s lawsuit claims the decision:
“is not supported by the findings, and the Academy’s findings are not supported by evidence.”
The LA suit aims to get the decision reversed.
A Talent Forever Tainted
A Holocaust survivor as a child, the Rosemary’s Baby and Chinatown director is much decorated with the Palm D’or, Baftas, Golden Globes, Cesars and Oscars. However, his life was forever impacted in 1969 when his pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, and four friends were brutally murdered by members of the Manson Family.
The most controversial episode in his life occurred in 1977. Polanski was arrested and charged in Los Angeles with five offenses against Samantha Geimer, a 13-year-old girl, rape by use of drugs, perversion, sodomy, lewd and lascivious act upon a child under 14, and furnishing a controlled substance to a minor.
Basically the full-house!
At his arraignment, Polanski pleaded not guilty to all charges but later accepted a plea bargain whose terms included dismissal of the five initial charges in exchange for a guilty plea to the lesser charge of engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse.
Polanski underwent a court-ordered psychiatric evaluation and a report was submitted to the court recommending probation.
However, upon learning that the judge was planning on jailing him, against the recommendations of the psychiatric evaluation, Polanski fled to France in February 1978, hours before he was to be formally sentenced.
Since then Polanski has mostly lived in France and has avoided visiting countries likely to extradite him to the United States.
Due to this Polanski is extremely unlikely to attend any court proceedings relating this lawsuit.
Hollywood Cowardly Hypocrites
Of course, the elephant in the room is how he remained feted and adored by Hollywood for decades after the sexual convictions.
He was awarded the Oscar for The Pianist, given standing ovations, defended by Meryl Streep, worked with Harrison Ford and Johnny Depp, and continued to work and win awards with full Hollywood support.
Tinseltown dwellers frequently claimed that the charges against him were trumped up and he was right to flee the biased American justice system.
Then in 2017, the #MeToo scandal broke and all of Hollywood was in the crosshairs.
As the entire town is basically guilty of systematic sexual abuse against wannabe stars, or the collusion in it, or knowing it was happening and just turning a blind eye, promoting and protecting those in positions of power who engaged in this activity, the entire town suffered a collective spasm of panic.
The uber virtue signallers who were forever telling lesser mortals how much better they were, how kind, how green, how liberally progressive, were about to be exposed as the scum they were.
As part of their panic-stricken response, Hollywood performed a complete 180 and switched from protecting and deifying Polanski as a hero and refugee from American law, to demonising him.
Therefore AMPAS has little choice but to engage in the tokenistic act of expelling Polanski, and like the rest of Hollywood, hoping these gestures would be enough to prevent anyone looking deeper into, for instance, the allegations of child trafficking and pedophilia rings being covered up to protect Hollywood’s powerful elites.
This lawsuit is like watching a fight between ISIS and Al-Qaeda. You don’t really want any side to win, you just hope there are massive casualties on both sides!
When approached for comment, AMPAS responded “Film who? Stop calling us!”
Chip in with your thoughts below.
