Change and progress sometimes can exact a painful price.
So one cringes and aches sitting through the harrowing, tearful and terrifying stories of seven rape victims in ”Rape: Cries From the Heartland” in the hope that its words, images and statistics that blister the screen can have some positive effect.
But is that the intention?
I always have problems with programs such as this-which look intimately at human pain and suffering through the video camera.
On television, there is a thin line between enlightenment and entertainment.
Jon Alpert, the program`s executive producer, has said: ”For women, these are times of danger and times of courage.
”Danger, because rape is the fastest growing violent crime in America.
”Courage, because more victims are openly confronting their attackers and society, speaking out about their trauma.”
An unusual degree of access was granted Alpert and producer/director Maryann DeLeo by the Rape Crisis Center in Memphis.
They say this has enabled them to ”show rape as it really is.”
That is very ghastly. Although the women working at the crisis center are kind, patient and caring, we are also given the anguish of families, the incredulity of cops.
One of the things we learn in the program is that most rapes go unreported. Will watching a young woman named Nicole get grilled by cops-she was drunk and was raped by two acquaintances-compel similar victims to come forward?
We see six other victims; most painfully a 72-year-old woman, an 8-year-old child and a mentally disabled woman. All have bruises, visible and otherwise.
But do not get the idea that this show is made up solely of first-person interviews. Some of the victims share their tears, a few words or their anger. But we are shown more than we may care to see of cops searching for suspects, cops interviewing witnesses and cops driving down streets. And all those sorry stats, flashing at us.
Will this ”America Undercover” presentation increase our understanding of rape? I don`t know; I can only hope.
It has already piqued the interest of CBS. As reported by Ellen Cohn in the Village Voice, a copy of the HBO tape made its way to the office of CBS`
”48 Hours” well in advance of its airing.
The ”48 Hours” staff was so taken with the subject and the manner of filming that the HBO tape was screened for employees of the YMCA Rape Crisis Center in Oklahoma City as an example of what ”48 Hours” would like to film there.
The head of that outfit called the head of the Rape Crisis Center in Memphis, Brenda Cassinello, who had not yet seen the tape filmed at her facility. She called HBO in outrage, and the cable outfit flew Cassinello and four staff members to New York for a private screening.
Cassinello told Cohn that she found the show ”raw, graphic and devastating, but a story that had to be told. It does not allow you to romanticize or mythologize rape.”
I hope viewers have the same impression.
”RAPE: CRIES FROM THE HEARTLAND”
An ”America Undercover” episode from HBO. Executive producer is Jon Alpert; produced and directed by Maryann DeLeo. Airing at 9 p.m. on HBO.
`Rise and Fall of Ceausescu` 9 p.m. Tuesday, PBS-Ch. 11
This is a compelling, a concise, and the most complete television chronicle to date of the life of Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu, culminating in their overthrow and execution in 1989 after their brutal rule of Romania.
There`s a lot of archival footage; observations of associates, politicians, foes and the couple`s daughter Zoia; and marvelously even-handed and thorough reporting by Edward Behr.
It`s a scary story, including the fact that Nicolea`s father was so drunk at his son`s birth that he gave him the same name as an older son.
