Comparing Polanski's work and Jackson's work is like using the art to justify a sentencing of negative publicity,, it doesn't matter; if they were guilty they deserve to be punished... Tyson served his time, I don't see how you can say that him being a convicted rape offender precludes him from the liberty of appearing at a crappy award show, unless you're going to say that all ex-cons should be treated differently..

Chinatown and Thriller are both in the top 10's of their respective industries in my opinion, comparing them is like trying to say whether Tiger Woods is better at golfing than Daniel Day Lewis at acting...

Polanski did deserve to go to jail, but it is a bit redundant at this point after the woman has publicly asked for the issue to be put to rest... I feel like the victim is just going to have to put up with a ridiculous amount of superfluous media attention all over again when she has moved on and said that she wishes the public would do the same...

Yeah, that's another thing; the woman in question is always ignored in these cases. It's like she's the ball in the competitive guilt basketball game (apologies if I made it seem so earlier). The court of public opinion is just trusted a lot more than it should be these days.

Woody Allen is case in point. It's not like Soon-Yi thought he was a criminal. The trial itself was a custody case, and yet many of my friends still refuse to watch his movies on moral grounds.

Polaski paid to settle the civil suit that the victim brought on him after he fled. He did not pay her to drop the charges (it was after he was found guilty), or pay the american judicial system to overturn the conviction. The man omitted guilt, was found guilty, and fled to avoid going to jail. Him paying his victim to save face has nothing to do with the fact that he still owes our government time in jail. 

How this is not a plain and simple lock-him-the-fuck-up is lost on me. 

How this is not a plain and simple lock-him-the-fuck-up is lost on me.

Wait, the American legal system is complicated and makes it exceedingly difficult to determine black-and-white guilt or innocence? Shocking!

Public perception affects the legal process in ways that goes beyond simple lock-him-the-fuck-up cases (though there are still plenty of those without national media coverage). I don't excuse his actions personally, I just want to make sure his punishment in line with actual legal precedent and some semblance of justice, neither of which are understood well, if at all, by most people opining on the subject (including myself).

Polanski's not a celebrity in that if you saw him on the street, you wouldn't instantly know who he is by face. Even if you watched Chinatown, you'd have to be a film nerd to know that he's the guy who plays the guy who slices Jack Nicholson's nose. You may not even know that Roman Polanski directed that film.

Conversely, if you saw Chinatown once (or even a couple of minutes of it on AMC), you would know that Jack Nicholson stars in it.

Chris Rock On Roman Polanski: "It's Rape! Rape!" (Video)

Last night on Jay Leno's new show, Chris Rock put on blast some of the attitudes surrounding director Roman Polanski, ripping into the rhetorical dances being done around what Polanski actually did - which was rape a thirteen year old.

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Johnny Cochrane: Well, did you see how well OJ played against New England?

lol

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Court docs that just surfaced say Roman Polanski agreed to pay his victim $500,000 in damages back in 1993 -- but records don't show if he ever paid.

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Read more: http://www.tmz.com/2009/10/02/polanski-agreed-to-pay-off-victim-in-1993/#ixzz0T4PCd8L0