'The Hurricane" with Denzel Washington was a great film as well, and it was very cool that Toronto had a large part in the story and in the film, but let it be known that the movie has absolute nothing on the book! I wish the actual content of the book could be dramatized into a film. The film is more about what happened with Rubin Carter much after the publication of the book.
In short summary I was very intrigued with the amount and degree of injustice, racism, violence and homosexuality that was present in the criminal justice system and in the prisons, victimizing men from before they even hit puberty.
Here is a clip of a tiny glimpse of one of Rubin's many early experiences in prison. I believe he was around the age of 11 at this time, and the boys referred to in this little segment range in age from about 8 to 14 years old.
"Now I might have been a little more naive than was considered healthy for a Jamesburg youngster at that time, but I'll be goddamned if I was downright stupid! Jamesburg had taught me something since I'd been incarcerated there: now I knew what a faggot was when I saw one, and this was what we had in tow - a goddamned faggot, a fuck boy.
Wait a minute. I'll have to retract that statement; it's not entirely the truth. The boy was not a committed homosexual, but he did submit, nonetheless, to what, I think, were the degrading desires of stronger inmates in return for cigarettes, food, and favor. At Jamesburg, it made no difference if one had or didn't have the inclination to be somebody's "wife." If one couldn't protect himself in a sure-fire, devastating manner in a fight, before very long he would find himself switching and "married" to a tougher inmate. So this boy was less a pedigreed faggot than a simple jailhouse punk, which in my estimation is the difference between sugar and shit.
When our group had arrived back at the smoking corner, the cigarettes were lit again and passed around to everybody except the newest member. He was instead ordered to remove his pajamas and lay down on his stomach. Then, one by one, each of my associates mounted the boy-girl's back, grunted for a minute, groaned for another, then shuddered and relaxed.
This was the first time that I had ever witnessed a homosexual act, and, to be truthful, it was neither fascinating nor overly repulsive to me. But it did stink. I looked upon the deed with an attitude of dishonorable indifference: indifference, in that it had no physical effect upon my person; dishonorable in that, if this punk had offered only a molecule, a mere speck - a tiny smithereen - of resistance, verbally or otherwise, I would have forced myself to become his ally and be ready to go to war again, if necessary.
But undeclared offers are worthless. When my turn came to take a ride in his saddle, I declined as gracefully as possible. The only person who seemed to be offended was the punk himself, and if he had said anything, I would have broken my foot off in his nasty ass. Nobody else pressed the issue. Then all went back to bed. Thus ended my first day in Cottage Eight."
pg 76, The Sixth Round
smh...
Anyways, it took me a while to finish the second last chapter, the details of the final trial, maybe because I knew what the outcome was going to be. But nonetheless it was a pretty captivating read all in all.
