Witness

                                                                                                                                         Sandra

“Witness”, by Australian director Peter Weir (who directed acclaimed films such as The Truman Show, Dead Poets Society and Master and Commander) is an American thriller film that involves passion, emotion, crime and has as protagonists the stars Harrison Ford and Kelly McGillis.

The film focuses on an Amish child, Samuel, who becomes the target of dangerous thieves. This Amish child ends ups witnessing a murder in which the victim was a cop whose throat was cut. John Book, a police detective who gets in charge of the investigation of this murder, only knows that the killer is a tall black man, and then takes the boy to the police station where Samuel tries to find the criminal in the photographs. Finally, the kid discovers who the murderer is when reading the newspaper and seeing the news of detective McFee, who is complimented for his work in the narcotraphic.

Samuel and his mother Rachel Lapp run away with Book to the Amish community where they used to live. However, Book’s idea of dumping Rachel and Samuel and leaving doesn´t work because when McFee tried to kill him, Book got severely injured. So John Book is forced to stay while he is recovering, and Rachel alerts him that he can´t go to a hospital because then it would be easy to locate Samuel and the person who shot him would likely kill the boy. Meanwhile, the assassins are still chasing them, trying to get them killed.

According to Wikipedia, “Witness” was a film well critiqued for involving the Amish religious freedom and the Pennsylvania government agreed not to promote Amish communities in the film because the Amish have a very traditional lifestyle with their community being very close and united. On the other hand, the Amish community has their own culture as for example: prayer before the meals, wearing always dark clothes and hats, sharing opinions together, and keeping usually the dialogue between them in perfect harmony. In my point of view, this is very important, to learn to respect the others and their rights, beliefs, values, without harming each other.

Therefore, the actors Harrison Ford and Kelly McGillis developed well their characters because they worked with integrity and sincerity. John Book is very eccentric, he loves his job and tries to be a good police detective, he is a self-confident friend, completely self-assured.

Meanwhile, Rachel Lapp is a romantic, good mother who loves her son and looks after him lots of times with care and tenderness. She has a different lifestyle. The central idea of the film is to rescue the two people from dangerous thieves, they hide in a close and united community.

On the other hand, the scenes that most impressed me were the their meals, when they thank God for the food, the grandfather´s dialogue when he alerts Samuel about the gun, the discovery of the love when Book and Rachel are dancing and exchanging smiles filled with lust, their goodbye filled with sadness having no other option.

The story shows an impossible love because of cultural shock. Rachel Lapp and John Book fell in love, but because of his job, he had to choice. It’s a very moving and incredibly powerful and devastating story which is brilliantly performed by the two lead actors, who have fantastic chemistry together. The target audience is adults.

Therefore, I recommend that you watch it because it was nominated for 8 Academy Awards. It is very good to discover the crime and to share opinions about the political investigation.

SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witness_(1985_film) (acesso no dia 16.08.2013)