I just watched this movie. It's about a 14 year old girl named Annie who meets a man online who poses as a teenager (Charlie). They meet IRL and he is actually middle aged. She goes along with him anyway and goes back to a motel room with him. He rapes her.
Her friend saw her with the man and Annie admits to having sex with him. Her friend reports what happened to the school.
The rest of the movie is about the fallout. Annie is at first in denial it was rape (even though in the scene she is telling him to wait and stop), saying she loves him. She resents her friend and family for making a big deal out of it and driving Charlie away. After learning he has multiple victims as young as 12, she realizes she was raped. She is bullied at school and attempts suicide.
During the film her father also becomes obsessed with revenge, and beats up a man who he think looks like Charlie. He does other stuff like pose as a teen girl in chat rooms and search the sex offender registry.
This movie has its flaws, the way the investigators behave is often unbelievable (having Annie continue to chat with Charlie to try and bait him so they can trace him, showing her photos of other victims, etc).
I bring this movie up because most of it is about the fall out of what happens after the rape. The investigation itself and the shame that comes from her parents knowing, her school knowing, etc. is significant and traumatic. Almost more traumatic than the rape itself it seems. What would happen if she remained in denial, potentially until she was much older and could realize what really happened to her?
This isn't me making a case to not investigate rapes, I don't think that is the way at all. But the forced therapization and her family harping on her reminding her of the shame every day seems to make things 10x worse.
Then we have the father. The father is consumed by his desire for revenge. He has dreams about beating the man and killing him, poses as a little girl in chat rooms to catch pedos, searches the sex offender registry and reads through his daughters explicit chats with the groomer. In olden society the father would have just killed the sick fuck that touched his daughter and had his catharsis. In modern society, it must be emasculating to have to wait for the investigation and justice system to work. And after all that, is it really as satisfying to see him go to jail after countless hours, sleepless ni
Post too long. Click here to view the full text.
