Confirmation

A television film set in Washington. The year is 1991. A justice is to be appointed to the Supreme Court. The nominee is Clarence Thomas. The Senate is running the confirmation. The process looks untroubled. Then a name comes up. Anita Hill is a law professor. She teaches in Oklahoma. She worked for Thomas years ago. At two different agencies. An investigator reaches her. He asks a question. She answers. Her statement goes into a report. The report leaks. From there the film becomes a story of hearings. The Senate Judiciary Committee convenes. Anita Hill is called to Washington. There are fourteen senators in the room. All of them men. She testifies. What she says is direct and detailed. The questions begin. The questions are turned on her. Why did she not say so at the time, why did she keep working for him, why did she call him. The narrative gives this unchanged; most of the scenes come from the actual transcript. Thomas testifies too. He calls the process a lynching. Public opinion splits from there. What the narrative is interested in is not an accusation but procedure: its idea is that the committee ran a political calculation rather than investigating a fact, and that both parties fell inside that machine. The other witnesses are not heard. Other women prepared to say the same thing wait outside the room and are not called. The narrative shows that plainly. Joe Biden chaired the committee and the narrative calls him to account as well. The outcome is known: Thomas is confirmed. A fact is given at the close. Complaints of harassment rose sharply after that year. Kerry Washington plays Anita Hill and plays her entirely measured. The production was made for a television channel. Rick Famuyiwa directed. Kerry Washington, Wendell Pierce, Greg Kinnear and Jeffrey Wright are in the cast. Who it is for: anyone interested in American political history and hearing-room narratives. Who it is not for: anyone looking for formal novelty; the narrative is in a television shape and is almost entirely talk.