Hot Coffee

In 1992 Stella Liebeck, aged seventy-nine, spilled a McDonald's coffee in her lap and suffered third-degree burns over sixteen per cent of her body; the skin burned away to muscle and fat and she needed grafts. She sued and won. Afterwards the case became a national joke: the woman who spilled hot coffee and asked for millions. Susan Saladoff's documentary shows how that story was constructed. The film's claim is that the case was deliberately distorted by large corporations and some politicians in order to argue for legal changes capping damages. The film opens the Liebeck file and shows the photographs. The narrative proceeds through four separate cases: caps on damages, campaigns run against elected judges, and mandatory arbitration clauses in employment contracts. Saladoff is herself a former trial lawyer. Who it's for: Viewers of documentaries about law and media, and narratives of corporate lobbying. Who it's not for: The film is openly one-sided and gives no room to the counter-argument. The photographs of the burns are also very hard to look at.