To The Gallows: A Movie Review
Introduction
‘Let Him Have It’ is a 1991 British drama based on true events from the life of Derek Bentley. It has been adapted from William Bentley’s book ‘My Son’s Execution’. Set in the Britain of 1953, characterised by poverty and struggle, it focuses on the misadventures of two young working-class boys, Derek Bentley and Chris Craig, which ultimately leads to the execution of Bentley and imprisonment of Craig. I have chosen to review this movie as I feel this movie encapsulates the shortcomings of our outdated judicial system quite accurately, like the usage of death sentence as a punishment. The movie asks critical questions that we as individuals should supposedly be asking of the third pillar of our democracy, in which we place utmost trust.
The purpose of doing this review is to analyse the judicial system with special focus on the death penalty. Using this review, I wish to point out how the system mercilessly takes innocent lives and uses capital punishment unnecessarily to serve justice. I intend to find out the numerous fallacies that persist in our judiciary even after years of continuous reforms and changes. Along with that, I want to describe the pathetic condition of our courts and the shabby state of the system, which makes it improbable for a common man to ever expect justice. The cost of attaining justice and the toll it takes on a person, both physically and mentally, dissuades people from fighting for their rights, which is destroying the very essence of the courtroom. The title of my review, ‘To the Gallows’, is a popular phrase used to describe a death sentence. A person dealt with a death sentence is said to have been “sent to the gallows” as ‘gallows’ is a scaffold that is used for execution by hanging.
Plot
The film was directed by Peter Medak and features an ensemble cast comprising Christopher Eccleston and Paul Reynolds in pivotal roles. Reception to the film was largely positive and it garnered huge critical approval. The film, which released on 4 October 1991, has been applauded for not holding itself back in showing outrage toward a system hell-bent on vengeance. Critics have particularly praised the script, for being direct and harbouring no nonsense.
The title of the movie, ‘Let Him Have It’, bears great connection to the plot of the movie. The entire trial hinges on the interpretation of these four words. Derek Bentley (Christopher Eccleston) is a 19-year-old epileptic young adult with the mental age of 11, due to a head injury Derek suffers as a child in 1941 when bombing raids were being carried over London. Derek quits reform school to come back home where he stays holed up in his room for over a year with only his pet turtle for company. In his quest for peer approval he falls in the company of Chris Craig (Paul Reynolds), a 16-year-old teenager with a fondness for American gangster films. Him and his friends practice acting like those gangsters by smoking cigarettes, carrying guns, committing small robberies and other petty crimes. In a scene from the movie, one of them is caught carrying a gun to school.
Craig convinces Derek to take part in a robbery at a warehouse. The two of them are cornered by police officers as they were trying to break into the building. The officer calmly asks Craig to hand over the gun to him. It is at this juncture that Derek says the four crucial words, “Let him have it.” These words can have two interpretations: first, to hand over the gun, or second, to shoot the officer. Craig opens fire, thereby killing police constable Sidney Miles and injuring sergeant Frederick Fairfax. The jury convicts both Craig and Bentley with charges of murder. In those times, murder was an offence that attracted the death sentence. Minors, however, were not awarded capital punishment. Consequently, Craig was only given a prison sentence, but Bentley faced orders of execution because the jury believed that Bentley’s words, “Let him have it,” were words of instigation for Chris to shoot at the police. After the conviction, there was massive public outcry over Bentley’s death penalty and his family began frantic efforts for clemency. However, Bentley was executed before the British Parliament could intervene.
Evaluation
Derek Bentley’s case is one that shook England’s belief in capital punishment. It was a landmark case in British legal history. As the end credits of the film point out, his family continued their fight after the execution. This led to a 45-year long campaign to win Derek a posthumous pardon, granted in 1993 (two years after the release of the film). Another campaign was also led for the quashing of his murder conviction in 1998. The film is an eye-opener about the merciless justice system that we have in place. It poses a question all of us need to ask ourselves — what is the meaning of justice?
Capital punishment is a hotly-debated topic in all corners of the world alike. There are worthy ambassadors for both sides of the argument. Making a film on such a sensitive issue and trying to make a statement through it is quite praiseworthy. Many films are made on capital punishment, but for me, none has come this close to striking the heart of the issue. This film has brought the spirit of Derek Bentley alive, in the form of a living example that whenever the law goes wrong, innocent lives are lost and there was no life more innocent than Derek Bentley’s. The movie does justice to Derek’s last words for his family in his letter, before the execution, “I tell you what Mum, the truth of this story has got to come out one day and that one day a lot of people are going to get into trouble.”
Peter Medak is scathing in his portrayal of the legal system. He has done an excellent job in showing the nature of the trial that was conducted for Bentley. In the courtroom, one can easily see that the judge and lawyers are towering over Bentley and asking him questions that the poor fellow couldn’t even fathom. Bentley was given no chance to save himself. The movie does well to question the proceedings of the trial and the rationale behind its judgement. It raises several pointed questions, like, how the court established Bentley’s intention to murder when he did not possess a gun in the first place?
The film also takes cognisance of the fact that Bentley’s mental state had no bearing on the case. It is well known that many prisoners get away using this defence. Also, under the scanner is how the court and jury arrived at the conclusion that the four key words, “Let him have it,” were an incitement to shoot, as any right-thinking person would assume them to mean to give up the gun. Bentley was denied the benefit of doubt at every stage. The director has done well to portray the protagonist as a victim straight from the opening scene, where Bentley is trapped under the rubble of a house. This goes a long way in generating sympathy for him, which was the film’s ultimate objective.
It was after 45 long, arduous years that Bentley was granted a full pardon by the British justice system. The film played a very significant role in obtaining justice for Bentley. The pardon was granted because of Bentley’s family’s continuous fight after he was hanged. In fact, the end credits of the movie mention that his sister was still fighting at the time the movie was released. Numerous filmmakers, writers and people of influence were pushed to take up the case, so that word about the case could be spread widely through movies and books. Derek Bentley’s tombstone fittingly reads — A Victim of British Justice.
Analysis
The biggest question that this film poses to its viewers is whether Derek Bentley deserve to die? Now we know that the answer to this question is a big no. Even the Court of Appeal admitted that a mistake had been made in convicting Bentley and quashed his conviction for murder in 1998. However, that proved to be too little, too late. It is often said, that justice delayed is justice denied. I cannot find a better example to justify these words.
It has been suitably established that Bentley was not provided with a fair trial and that crucial evidence was withheld from the court. These startling facts raise several pertinent questions about the delivery of justice in our courts. In an ancient debate between Socrates and Thrasymachus, the latter remarked that “Justice is but the interest of the stronger.” I whole-heartedly agree with this statement. We live in a time where justice comes with a price tag, where justice can be ‘fixed’ for immaterial sums of money. By this, I mean that representation by a capable lawyer is a luxury only the affluent can afford and India has quite a name for its expensive and complicated legal system.
The other fundamental focus of this movie is capital punishment. It will not be wrong to say that the public’s general sense of unease after Derek Bentley’s execution led to the abolition of death penalty in Britain in 1965. There has always been a raging debate on the use of death penalty for culprits of serious offences such as rape, murder and terrorism to name a few. Whether it is impactful in terms of delivery of justice is a question that cannot be answered in a few sentences. My view is that death penalty is not the answer.
Many argue that crimes can be controlled only if we are able to scare the criminals out of committing them. That is not the case. If at all, criminals will only be further motivated by the fact that they will not have to rot in jails if caught, rather they can put an end to it all quickly. The last person to be sent to the gallows in India, Yakub Memon (accused of financing the 1993 Mumbai blasts) sparked off a big debate on the issue of death penalty in India with many eminent personalities such as Markandey Katju and Ram Jethmalani criticising his death sentence.
In India, capital punishment is given only in the rarest of rare cases, as the Constitution bench of the Supreme Court of India made it clear in Bachan Singh vs. State of Punjab. On the court’s recommendation, police brutality and honour killings are included under the rarest of rare cases. India has a restorative criminal justice system, which means that it focuses on reforming the victim rather than punishing along with restoring the relations between the community and the offenders. This process has been established to protect the basic human rights of the culprit, the crux of which is that the culprit, even after committing a crime, is still a human. At the core of the system is the belief that the offender must have a fair chance to start fresh after the punishment.
It can be said that the objective of a reformative system of punishment is to turn the offender into a law-abiding citizen once again. The post-credit scenes of ‘Let Him Have It’ mention that Chris Craig, after being released from prison, became a law-abiding citizen for the rest of his life. Such is the power of the reformative system. An innocent life, of Derek Bentley, could have been spared if the same principle had been applied to him as well.
Conclusion
This film was an eye-opener for me. There are several issues pointed out by Peter Medak in this movie that need to be deliberated upon and set right. It is a sad truth that there has been no drastic change in the situation from when the case of Derek Bentley took place, to the time this film released and from then to now. Our judicial system is in shambles. The backlog of cases in our courts is tremendous. Even the lower courts have cases pending that were filed over a decade ago. Since judicial appointments are not made properly in due time, each existing judge must take up hundreds of cases each day. The shortage of judges in courts, even in High Courts, is quite alarming. How can we let this continue? There is a lot remaining to be fixed.
The issue of capital punishment rages on. In the midst of all the debate around the issue, innocent lives, like that of Derek Bentley, are lost from time to time to remind us of our duty as law-abiding citizens to get involved in matters that concern us directly. If we don’t start asking questions, things will only get worse.
