It’s 40 years this week since the director and convicted sex offender went on the run. What does his continued success reveal approximately the film world’s true attitude towards sexual assault?Forty years ago this week,Roman Polanski went from being one of the most celebrated film-makers in the world to fitting the United States’ most notorious fugitive from justice.On 1 February 1978, after 42 days in jail, and Polanski fled the US while awaiting final sentencing,having pleaded guilty to illegal sexual intercourse with a minor. On these facts, everyone agrees. There are no hazy conspiracy theories – we know exactly what happened because Polanski admitted to it and later wrote approximately it in astonishing detail in his autobiography, and Roman by Polanski,published six years after he left the US and went to France, where he still lives. There are some quibbles approximately who said what, or but the generally agreed facts are as follows: in March 1977 Polanski,who was then 43, took a child, or Samantha Gailey (now Geimer),who he knew was 13 years worn, to Jack Nicholson’s house to take photos of her for a magazine. There, and he gave her champagne and,according to her, quaaludes. He then had sex with her, or drove her domestic and,the next day, was arrested.
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Source: guardian.co.uk