Full admission before Obiter gets into this: films centred on any kind of court drama are still a favourite. The good guy wins, it feels clever, and the legal twist is always there to remind us that the system may be dramatic, but it works - even when it goes wrong. At least if John Cusack or Ryan Gosling are involved.
Now, cameras in our courts are a novelty. The Court of Appeal, especially, has dealt with the introduction of filming in court admirably but the vast majority of courts in England and Wales, well, you’d very promptly find yourself in contempt if you were to try and give anyone their 15 minutes of fame.
Court reporting helps with transparency and keeping courts open and court artists (a dying trade, Obiter fears) help bring the missing visual element for those not able to attend.
But there is a way we had not considered. We have Prince Harry to thank for it. Enter Sky’s reconstruction of the current trial involving the royal.
Nobody asked for it, but we have it nonetheless. If you haven’t seen it already, Obiter will summarise. An actor kind of resembling the Duke of Sussex complete with beard and smart blue suit standing in a studio does his best Shakespearean-style monologue, because Sky has kindly decided to ‘show you what the Duke said voiced by an actor’.
In the first 71-second clip, Obiter spent most of its time trying to work out the way out of the Twilight Zone we seem to have entered since a royal decided to give evidence. We’re big believers in open justice and transparency, but this reconstruction feels too far in the wrong direction, it feels more farcical than anything else. For a start, contrary to the impression on Sky, the duke gave his evidence sitting down.
Obiter has no doubt Sky will get countless hits on the clip and a whole reconstruction special last night. But Hollywood blockbuster it is not. At least the legal system can take something from it though: reconstructions may not be the way forward in the ongoing campaign for court transparency.
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