The dark side of Hollywood: Tracing Roman Polanski’s abhorrent criminal acts
As we well know, there lies a dark underbelly in the world of Hollywood, the centre of the Western film world. Having several figures in positions of enormous power has tragically led to an abuse of such power with ongoing sexual misconduct in the case of convicted rapists such as Harvey Weinstein rife in Los Angeles. Perhaps of the most notorious cases is in the life of director Roman Polanski.
French-Polish filmmaker Polanski is known for directing the horror classic Rosemary’s Baby, the first movie he made after moving to the United States from France via the United Kingdom, where he had many several other films, including Cul-de-sac and Repulsion, the latter of which is a fitting title for the period of his life that would follow.
Polanski’s wife, actor Sharon Tate, was murdered in 1969 when she was heavily pregnant by several members of the Manson Family. However, the trauma he suffered is of course no excuse for the horrific sexual abuse crimes he committed in the 1970s against a then 13-year-old girl named Samantha Gailey.
In March of 1977, Polanski was charged with drugging and raping Gailey. The charges included rape by use of drugs, sodomy, perversion, performing a lewd and lascivious act upon a child under 14, unlawful sexual intercourse with a female under the age of 19, and giving a controlled substance to a minor.
The incident arose when Polanski asked Gailey’s mother if he could take pictures of her daughter for an edition of French Vogue. Gailey later claimed that she felt uncomfortable during the shoot, especially when Polanski asked her to remove her clothes. She is said to have reluctantly agreed to a second shoot which took place at Jack Nicholson’s home in 1977. Nicholson had been away during the second shoot, but his then-girlfriend Anjelica Huston had come back while Polanski and Gailey were still there.
Gailey’s testification claimed that Polanski gave her a Quaalude and champagne before he performed oral sex on her and had vaginal and anal sex despite her protests. The charges resulted in a plea bargain in which Polanski pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor in return for the more serious charges being dismissed.
As part of the plea bargain, Polanski was also ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. The court, for some bizarre reason, allowed the director to finish working on his current project, so he was able to fly to Europe to complete the remake of Hurricane. He did return to Los Angeles, completing just 42 of the 80 days of the psychiatric evaluation, but upon learning that he was likely to be convicted, he fled to London.
After London, Polanski moved on to France, where he was, of course, a citizen and could avoid being extradited back to the United States. Polanski has since lived in countries where he is unlikely to be ordered to return back to the US, making awful comments about his crimes along the way.
In 1979, he told the British novelist Martin Amis: “If I had killed somebody, it wouldn’t have had so much appeal to the press, you see? But… fucking, you see, and the young girls. Judges want to fuck young girls. Juries want to fuck young girls. Everyone wants to fuck young girls!”
Polanski settled a lawsuit with Gailey, by then married and known as Samantha Greimer, in 1993 out of court, although he subsequently missed payments. It appeared at one point that Polanski would be brought to justice. In 2009, he was held by Swiss police at Zurich airport under his original 1978 arrest warrant in the United States.
The director had been heading to the Zurich Film Festival as the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award, but a United States request to detain him was accepted by the Swiss authorities. Rather amazingly, Polanski’s arrest led several prominent figures in the film industry, especially those in Hollywood, to come to his defence and demand that he be freed.
The publicity seemed to work, and on July 12th, 2010, nearly ten months after being detained at the airport, Polanski was released from custody. He is yet to return to the United States, continuing to work in Europe, releasing films that are widely admired, despite his shocking crimes.
Roman Polanski is certainly one of the most controversial directors of all time. His movies are some of the most critically admired works in history, and even to this date, he has vehement defence coming from across the globe. Still, the sickening crimes he committed in the 1970s cannot be forgiven, nor can the awful way he later reflected on them. Polanski will continue to be one of those figures where people question whether they really can separate the art from the rapist.
