Question of Privilege (1999) User Reviews

I didn't think that you could count that high!

[sol-kay · 5/10 · 21 February 2009]

***SPOILERS***A fine cast especially actor David Keith, as Assistant D.A Carter Roberts, is wasted in this utterly confusing crime drama involving the gang rape and murder of 14 year old Mary wells played by, in her first and last movie appearance,Victoria Rutwind.

Picked up and taken down by the river Mary is found the next morning raped and beaten, with her windpipe crushed, to death. It didn't take much to find those, four teenager, suspected in Mary's rape & murder since they more then admitted to raping her. But as for who if any of them murdered Mary they seemed to be hiding something that the police and D.A's office may have overlooked.

It's up to assistant D.A Carter Roberts to prosecute those who were arrested in Mary's death with the two top suspects being the Aldridge Boys Joel & Ian, Eric Johnson & Myles Ferguson. It also just happens that the boy's father Tate Aldridge, Tom Butler, is the richest and most politically connected man in town. Old Man Aldridage is more then willing to do anything to get his boys off even going so far as using Carter's wife Andrea (Jessica Steen), a defense attorney herself, to do it!

As things start to look bad for both Joel & Ian a mysterious video tape surfaces showing the policeman investigating them Lt. Robert Ingram Michael Ironside, conversing with the boy's lawyer Kyle Reeves, David McNally, thus having the case thrown out of court. The repercussions of this meeting also has Reeves' boss Gail Sterling, Wendy Crewson, lose all of Tate Aldridge's business causing her law-firm to almost go belly-up! The biggest shock of all is that it was Andrea who with the help of the scuzzy pot smoking bartender Owen Kerr, Benjamin Ratner, uncovered the incriminating video tap. All this behind the scenes chicanery had Andrea's husbands who was the prosecuting attorney, which she had no knowledge of him being, career in the D.A's office go straight down the tubes.

It's when your trying to figure out where exactly the movie is going all the teenagers involved in Mary Well's murder become targets of a mysterious killer. The killer is either seeking revenge in Mary's murder or is her killer himself trying to shut up those who can identify and turn him over to the police.

****SPOILER ALERT****Far out and crazy plot that has just about everyone suspected in Mary's murder end up being murdered themselves. The big surprise in the movie is that the punishment didn't fit the crime in that those who raped Mary ended up dead but her actual killer got off Scot-free! As for the shadowy killer himself he, or she, was so obsessed with his attempt to avenge Mary Well's murder that he, in his zeal to execute street justice, not only offed the wrong persons but, when caught red-handed, ended up offing himself as well!

Abysmal

[rps-2 · 2/10 · 1 October 2000]

It used to be that either a bottle of Canadian wine or a Canadian film sent people scurrying. The wines have improved. The films have not. This is an absurd plot with high school level acting, incompetent production and threadbare sets. Better we do no films than grind out embarassments like this. I was generous with a 2 vote. I regret not giving it a 1. However l is described as "awful." This film demands a stronger word.

Avoid at all cost

[s_schilthauer · 1/10 · 31 August 2000]

Watching a plot that doesn't work because it's an obvious construction and actors portraying one dimensional and unbelievable characters for any period of time is a painful experience.

Avoid at all cost.

I don't understand how the two attorneys play a role in this movie...

[awdracer · 1/10 · 3 October 2005]

This was a movie I had high expectations for. It was a late-night movie, and I had just watched this last night, and I was given the information that they would "face-off in the courtroom", yet I saw nothing about a courtroom. I'm thinking of going to Law school in the future, and I was greatly disappointed by the movie's plot, for it was a misleading description and used methods of trickery to make me watch this. To the people who would consider watching this, AVOID.

The movie has two characters (mainly), who happen to be husband-and-wife attorneys. They have a child named Sarah, who plays almost no role in this movie, which is surprising because they didn't have to include her at all. The police detective, who don't seem a tiny bit intelligent while investigating the crimes. He doesn't ever seem to use his brain to find people, instead he points fingers at people based on very little evidence. This detective is not only terrible as a character, but terrible as a detective on all levels. Normal police detectives would go through evidence gathered from crime scenes (at least 3 people died in this movie), however the detective(s) from the movie FAIL to show that he/they are doing ANY work. (It really seems like this detective never does his homework).

Joel, the tallest and the oldest, of the young boys, is charged with the crime of killing a girl named Mary Wells, and sure enough, the police get a prosecutor (Carter) to argue that they were criminally responsible. Carter's wife, who is the other attorney, conflicts with him for the first 30 minutes of the movie, then she changes sides (she ultimately cost him his job because of some "evidence" she found and felt guilty throughout the movie). Later, she begins to doubt the innocence of Joel and the young boys, and maybe perhaps foul play was involved. (What kind of lawyer is this? She's hired as a defense attorney and then she doubts their innocence? What is she getting paid for then?) The husband got over his job predicament, and later he gets his job back. By the time, the movie was almost over, and later more people die, and the two lawyers (not the detective) are near the crime scene because they wanted to "talk" to Joel. Sure enough, they find the body of Joel, and if I'm not mistaken, the wife even touches Joel.

Overall, this movie had NOTHING to do with the courtroom. These attorneys didn't actually seem like attorneys because it does not correctly simulate what their job is really like. Who in the right mind would have husband and wife NOT in the same firm? The boss in the movie says of Carter's wife "You're a damn fine lawyer" (or something to that effect), yet we see no evidence of this. The acting was OK i guess, but the movie script and the plot is DEFINITELY lacking with information. The lawyers do nothing in court, which raises the question why they are placed in this movie in the first place. They play almost no role in determining crimes, that's for the police to deal with and they go to court about it, where the lawyers would investigate holes during the investigation. The opposing lawyers would then build up a case for their appropriate clients and go to court to battle it out. This movie contained nothing about it.

Avoid at all costs.

An enjoyable mystery.

[Tam-16 · 7/10 · 7 November 1999]

A suspenseful movie plotting husband against wife in a case involving four young men raping and killing a young girl. The movie twists and turns with clues, and yet, until the final 15 minutes of the movie, your still not sure who the killer is. The plot is interesting, but the acting is sluggish and unrealistic at times. All in all though, I enjoyed the movie and gave it a 7.

Only the Privileged Few **

[edwagreen · 28 August 2011]

Overbearing film with several themes that could have easily formed the bases of their own plots.

I thought this was going to be a film dealing with the trials and tribulations of a married couple finding themselves on the opposite sides regarding 4 boys accused of killing a young fourteen year old girl.

Instead, this turns into a complex web of entanglement. Just about everyone comes under scrutiny including an over zealous, nasty officer.

The ending is equivalent to the macabre, especially when we are all aware that nothing much is ever accomplished via suicide. There is the always overly dramatic scene before the trigger is pulled. Perhaps, the latter should have been pulled on this production.

A Stupid and Unjust Movie About Rape and Murder!

[BreanneB · 4 June 2006]

This movie is total cheese. It stank. I give it 0/10 stars. It is a movie about four boys who rape and murder a girl and get away with it. That's not fair or just.

After picking up a girl at a gas station, four perverts-monsters take her out to an isolated area by a river where they rape, torture, abuse, and murder her. Then when they get caught they go to a female attorney. She takes the case.

It turns out that the prosecutor is her husband. She gets them acquitted of all charges and they go free. What about justice and fairness.