A working-class teenager in 1793 New York accuses a wealthy man of rape, igniting a landmark trial and public unrest that exposes how a new nation’s ideals of justice were built on discrediting women—a legacy that still endures.
Seventeen-year-old seamstress Lanah Sawyer lives on the margins of a rapidly forming New York City in 1793, where class boundaries are rigid and a woman’s reputation is everything. When a charming stranger—secretly a member of an elite family—assaults her, Lanah refuses silence and brings charges against him, thrusting herself into a legal system unprepared to protect her. At trial, her testimony is overshadowed by scrutiny of her character, as defense strategies recast her behavior as evidence against her. After his acquittal sparks public outrage and citywide unrest, Lanah endures mounting personal and social pressure but persists, bringing a second civil case with the support of her stepfather. As competing narratives of her story circulate in courtrooms, newspapers, and the emerging legal record, Lanah fights to assert her own account within systems that seek to define and discredit her. Though the outcome offers only partial justice, her case exposes the origins of a legal and cultural framework that continues to shape how sexual violence is judged and understood.
Kristy Guevara-Flanagan is an Assistant Professor at UCLA’s School of Theatre, Film and Television where she heads the MFA Directing Documentary concentration. She has been making documentary films that focus on gender and representation for nearly two decades, starting with a 1999 experimental documentary about a blow-up doll (which screened at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, among other venues). Her first feature-length film, Going on 13 (2009), covers four years in the lives of four adolescent girls; it premiered at Tribeca and was broadcast on PBS. Her feature, Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines (2012/2013), traces the evolution and legacy of the comic book hero Wonder Woman as a way to reflect on society's anxieties about women's liberation. The film garnered numerous awards, premiered at the South by Southwest Film Festival and was broadcast on the PBS series Independent Lens in 2013. Her recent short, What Happened to Her (2016) premiered at the Hot Docs Canadian Film Festival, where it received an honorable mention for best short. The film is currently in distribution with Women Make Movies. Kristy’s work has been funded by ITVS, the Sundance Institute, the Tribeca Institute, Latino Public Broadcasting, and California Humanities.
