SnoopyStyle In 1977, Roman Polanski was arrested after having sex with and providing drugs to a 13 year old Samantha Geimer in Los Angeles. She had gone with her mother to do a photo shoot with the famed director for a magazine. The mother leaves Samantha alone with Polanski and they have sex. The lawyers come to a plea without jail time. Judge Rittenband using questionable methods orders a 90 days psychiatric evaluation in prison. After serving 42 days, he is released. With favorable reports, he expected probation but the judge is under pressure to impose a heavier sentence. In 1978, he left for Europe and has not yet returned to America.The overriding question for me is, "Did he have sex with a 13 year old girl?". At the end of the day, he did the crime and he spent 42 days in protected custody. It's not the biggest injustice ever. In fact, I don't see it as that harsh. The most revealing element is the incompetent judge. He is worst than judge Ito but I doubt he's the worst. The movie dives into Polanski's troubled life but it doesn't have him explaining himself. He is an enigma in this movie.

DICK STEEL For those who want a quick snapshot of the entire hullabaloo surrounding acclaimed director Roman Polanski and the slew of charges against him, one for having sex with a minor of 13 years, then this documentary by Marina Zenovich will present everything on a silver platter in digestible portions, though with any documentary, objectivity sometimes gets a little bit skewed. If you ask me for an opinion, I'm still a firm believer of serving time if done the crime, and under an imperfect system, there are always instances where we see the rich and the famous escape jail terms, like in Law Abiding Citizen which preached that truth is only what you can prove in a court of law.In presenting facts and the case itself, Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired did a brilliant job in establishing the premise and providing that broad background of the director and his life, which seemed to have been rooted in tragedy from his childhood days during the Holocaust, and including the senseless murder of his pregnant wife Sharon Tate under the hands of the Charles Manson family. Clips from his iconic films were also included, and parallels somehow uncannily drawn from his darker films to mirror the darker days of his life, which worked in emphasizing his twisted state of mind if you're standing on that side of the fence.Zenovich also spent considerable time painting the picture of the media frenzy which surrounded Polanski during his younger heydays, and especially during the trial, where a distinction was made between the European and American press, one still fascinated by yet another twist and turn in his life, while the latter firmly demonizing a stranger in their midst, whose demeanour and physical built made it almost perfect as that classical villain out to exploit the meek. It's a media circus built around the director's reputation, which served as a double edged sword according to some as it is this repute that allowed the sensationalism to hit the roof in terms of selling papers.What's more intriguing in this documentary, is how Zenovich assembled and presented the crux of the film, that on the appointment and backgrounds of the legal eagles handling the case, with talking head interview segments with the lawyers involved. It's a pity that the judge Laurence J Rittenband was not included in modern day interviews because of his passing, but from the archived clips, court documents and testimonies gathered, his is the key which probably made Polanski flee. After all, how can one trust a court presided by a judge with ulterior personal motives ranging from wanting to get the limelight from such a high profile case, to having personal emotions play such a huge part in deciding on punishment, and the benefits of lack thereof to personal reputation.It's down to Zenovich's skill in assembling the timeline of events, recounting court incidents and evidence that makes this documentary a compelling watch, especially when she launches into a tirade that questions the integrity of the judge through his gerrymandering of the entire legal process and the perversion of justice, and how a judge, competent or otherwise, holds plenty of cloud over the proceedings and punishment, despite flip-flopping on bargains and promises made.It's been decades since that faithful day of the deed, and both the director and the child back then had already moved on in their lives. It's quite clear that both want to put this episode behind them with even the victim forgiving Polanski, and public opinion as well as that of peers are divided between forgiveness and punishment nonetheless, it's interesting to see how things will develop hereon, after all it has been left hanging in the balance already for so long. Like I mentioned, this documentary somehow portrayed Polanski as a victim of an inconsistent court process yes, but you cannot deny that a crime is a crime, and one has to face the music, famous personality or not.

paul2001sw-1 It's the mark of a civilised society that, no matter how terrible the crime of which you are accused, you are entitled to a trial in accordance with due process; and although some perpetrators may sometimes escape the full consequence of their crimes by playing the system, that's better than mob rule, or a judiciary with arbitrary powers. In this sense, Roman Polanski was badly treated: convicted only of sexual intercourse with a minor, the outcome of due process was unacceptable to public opinion, so in sentencing, the judge ignored the law. Polanski fled the U.S and has never returned (although since this film was made, he has been arrested in Switzerland and faces extradition). On the other hand, while only convicted of a minor offence, this was due to a plea-bargain agreed by the state because of the reluctance of the alleged victim to testify; had Polanski been tried and convicted of all charges (including rape), he would have gone to prison for a long time whatever the judge. But that trial did not occur and the verdict it would have returned is thus unknown. The story may not be a happy one; but Polanski is as entitled to impartial justice as anyone, and did not get it.The backdrop to all this is a culture in 1970s California of young women making themselves available freely to rich and attractive men. The joke was that the prosecutor, a Mormon, was selected because he was the only lawyer in the office who hadn't committed the same offence himself. You may feel this is only natural, and that Polanski was just unlucky to be picked out for persecution for doing a very normal thing; or that the whole culture was rotten, and "why me?" is not an adequate defence. And remember that the original charge was of rape. The most disturbing thing I found in this entire film was a defence put together by some of Polanski's friends, who criticised the victim's mother: Polanski, they argued, was known to like sleeping with young women, so what was the mother doing in introducing her daughter? The assumption here, that Polanski was obviously have sex with a thirteen year old if given the chance, and that it was everybody else's responsibility to make sure this didn't happen, is enough in itself to make a little part of you wish Polanski was sent to gaol for life.Marina Zenovich's film tells Polanski's extraordinary life story (of which the trial is only one part), has interviews with all the right people, and is consistently revealing. Because the tale ends with judicial manipulation, it induces a kind of sympathy for Polanski he probably doesn't deserve. On one hand, he has had a tragic life. On the other, he does appear to be a man who believes his own talent and sexual magnetism give him carte blanche to do whatever he can get away with. One thing is clear: neither he nor his victim got justice.

Niklas Pivic This HBO documentary is not about Roman Polanski's entire life. In fact, it is to the greatest extent centered in the court case from which he fled in 1978, where he was sentenced for unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, in fact a 13-year-old girl. A lot of archive footage is used and is very well-edited to paint a picture of a great director who has battled a lot of turmoils in life (most notably the murder of his wife, Sharon Tate). A lot of judicial figures are interviewed in depth regarding the court case, the very peculiar (and probably criminal) judge Rittenband, along with journalists from the time and friends of Polanski. The music - mostly period jazz - is used very nicely, often alongside period snippets from TV news. The main character is not interviewed for this documentary, and while I feel the documentary skirts away too much from Polanski's pedophile act, his victim has since forgiven him and there are a couple of interesting facts about her mother's role in the case. All in all this is a good documentary about the chilling events surrounding a human being who happens to be a world-renowned film-director. By the way, David Wells has admitted to lying in the documentary, and it's interesting to see if anything will really happen to Polanski now that he - 31 years after fleeing the USA - is arrested in Switzerland because of his outstanding punishment.