BATTERED (INTIMATE STRANGERS)

US, 1977, 100 minutes, Colour.
Dennis Weaver, Sally Struthers, Tyne Daly, Larry Hagman, Melvyn Douglas, Quinn Cummings.
Directed by John Llewellyn Moxey.

Battered is, as the title suggests, a film about violence in the home. Dennis Weaver portrays an ordinary man who experiences pressures at work and then beats his wife at home as compensation. Sally Struthers portrays the wife.

The film was nominated for an Emmy, was courageous in dramatising wife abuse in the late 1970s. Another film, The Burning Bed with Farrah Fawcett, made a great impact in the 1980s.

1. The quality of this telemovie? Production values? Gaining audience attention because of its theme and style?

2. The value of bringing social issues into the home? The effect on the varying members of the family audience? What influence does a film like this have? For home viewing, punctuated by commercials etc.?

3. The relevant information, statistics about wife-battering? Facts, emotional response to situations? Indications of groups for aid, legal procedures? The influence of change of law for women?

4. The initial presentation of the family, the balance between tension and love? The focus on Don and his buying the camper, money deals, his own self-esteem? The contrast with Janice and her seeming to be dumb? The ordinary children? The background of their fighting, blended with joy? Talk about battering, the indications for the drama to unfold? How well did the film get audiences to identify with the characters and thus with the themes?

5. The portrait of Don at work, the important policy, the questions of promotion of younger men, his relationship with Mort and their bragging, his self-reliance and moodiness against his boss? The moodiness of the loan of the policy? Its breaking out and battering his wife? The importance of the visit of the police and whether they should have pressed Janice to make charges? His avowals that he would change? The comment that a wife-batterer does not change and the danger extends to the children?

6. The portrait of Janice, how smart was she, how dumb? Her questions, inefficiency with the budget, nagging? Reacting to his night out? Her lying to the police after the battering? Her wanting to make up? The effect of the battering on the children as they watched? The visuals of Janice at the club and her friends seeing her, the phone number given from the battered wife?

7. The understanding of Don, home situations, work, bragging, money, the night out with the prostitute, jealousy at Karen's party? What motivated him? Why so moody and violent? The influence of his father?

8. Janice and the contrast with Karen? Literally bumping into her, the presentation of the divorced and career woman, her party and the people there and Janice's enjoyment, Don's resentment? The memories of the past and Karen's revelation of what Don and Janice were like? Her willingness to help? Her confrontation of Don with so much of the truth when she got Janice's clothes? The important discussion and Janice's accusing Karen of failure? Insight into marriage, divorce, reconciliation?

9. The importance of the sequences with Don's father, the explanation of the background, of his harshly being brought up, the present and his father dissatisfied in the home? His father bashing his mother? The ideals and the expectations set for Don?

10. The dramatic impact of the discussion groups and the points of view represented, pro and con women's rights, husbands', the responsibility and blame? Information about State laws? the warnings about repetition of bashing and Janice's dismay, her continual going back, the violence and her hurried leaving? hospitalisation?

11. Don, his arrest, his wanting to change, his trying to blackmail Janice emotionally? The significance of his conversation with Mort after being bailed out and his realization of his actions? Mort's disgust?

12. The build-up to the court case, Don's uncertainty and the significance of the final conversation and his admitting his fear?

13. The indefinite nature of the ending and leaving it to the audience to ponder? How convincing a film in themes and performance? How much influence in appreciating the problems of battering?