The Roman Polanski case — or the Roman Polanski cultural wars as some are putting it — has obviously hit a collective cultural nerve and created polarized factions: the pitchfork-touting crowds and defenders both coming out in equal force.
“American lynch mobs never die; they only become more self-righteous about their savagery,” is a good Jonathan Rosenbaum quote making the rounds in the pro-corner, or at least in the corner of anti-ugliness.
Famous-named defenders that the burning torches crowd can now detest have grown in numbers and Cannes Film Festival director Thierry Fremaux has started a petition to free Polanski and enlisted Harvey Weinstein who said, “We’re calling on every film-maker we can to help fix this terrible situation.” Various world-renowned filmmakers such as Marty Scorsese, Pedro Almodovar, Steven Soderbergh, John Landis, Jonathan Demme, David Lynch, Deborah Winger, Fatih Akin, Darren Aronofsky, and more than 100 filmmakers, actors and industry types have signed (some are are also cracking wise that Woody Allen has also signed it; here’s a gigantic list of names). Apparently this girl at Jezebel will be boycotting all the works from all these filmmakers backing him which basically means she’s never going to see a movie again. Or at least not an even half-decent one.
Though Hollywood backing their own is hardly surprising or unexpected.
And as this news cycle moves — incredibly fast — it already appears that those championing his release are being drowned out by the noise created for those against him. At least today, who knows where the media will land tomorrow, but today they’re focusing on the negative. Not all of Hollywood is apparently for Polanski. Stop the presses as Kirstie Alley says we should not celebrate or defend the director which actually isn’t bad advice.
French officials seem to be backing down from their outraged tone at his surprise arrest on the weekend. Earlier this week, two French cabinet ministers were criticized for leaping too quickly to his defense and now a French government spokesman has turned in a more even-handed and serious tone. “Roman Polanski is neither above or below the law. We have a judicial proceeding underway that is a serious affair, the rape of a minor, for which the American and Swiss justice systems are carrying on their work. This case is particularly complex because it involved four countries, France, Poland, Switzerland and the United States.”
The U.K. Telegraph has penned a poisonous editorial called, What if Roman Polanski’s daughter had been raped. And the temperature media-wise definitely seems to be shifting. In a very somewhat strange-sounding move from the outset, the film “Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky” was pulled from the Zurich Film Festival by its French (ahh, that’s it) director Jan Kounen in direct protest of Polanski’s incarceration (which the lynch mob will be only too displeased to hear is rather cushy and fitted with a TV, bed and table).
Not helping one bit at all is Debra Tate, the sister of Polanski’s murdered wife Sharon Tate who was on the Today Show this morning and essentially declared him innocent.
Meanwhile Polanski is expected to spend at least a few weeks in Swiss detention before any decision is made about his extradition to the U.S. or his release, but Polanski’s lawyers will likely fight this every step of the way, but perhaps with France now adopting a graver tone, maybe he won’t be released as easily as some pundits have suspected.