Best movie ever!

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Forcible rape is such a traumatic violation of personal space that it's hard to imagine what feelings it brings in its wake. Men who find it even more difficult to imagine need to watch the movie "Deliverance." In her husband's absence, Montgomery is raped by an innocent-looking young man she meets at night school. Afterward, she scrubs herself and disposes of the clothing, and she's too embarrassed to tell anyone about it, not even her friend and neighbor (Patricia Smith) or her own husband (Ronny Cox). She tries to call the police but the officer at the other end of the line is busy and distracted, calling out to someone, "Make it with cream cheese!" Cox returns from his trip happy with the results and is too animated for her to talk to.Then the innocent-looking young man assaults her again in an underground parking lot. This time he punches her and leaves her bruised, more or less forced now to report these incidents to the police.It has to be said that the movie dates poorly and that the moral lesson is cheapened by the way it's structured. When I say "dated", I mean that the message was pertinent in 1974 when the movie was shown. We're more sophisticated about these things now. People take rape seriously and don't get it mixed up with rough but consensual intercourse. The person at the other end of 911 is going to tak you seriously. When we were in Newark, New Jersey, my son tried to call his mother in North Carolina. The area code is 901, but he dialed 911 by mistake and hung up at once when he realized the error. Five minutes later, two police officers knocked on the door with the snaps on their holsters unfastened. The responders are more considerate, the victims are more knowledgeable, and the community more understanding. It isn't 1974 anymore, and thank God for that.When I say the story is structured in a way that cheapens the theme, I mean, for instance, that except for Elizabeth Montgomery and her children, everyone else is semi-moronic. After she reports the second rape, she's forced to undergo the complete rape kit, have photos of her bruises taken, and those who are doing the exam are brusque beyond belief. Montgomery sits huddled in the waiting room on a bench filled with pimps, cross-dressers, junkies, and other devalued people. Then some orderly with a clipboard enters the room and begins shouting, "We got a RAPE here? Who's the RAPE case. You have to sit in the wheelchair because RAPES aren't allowed to walk." And of course everyone is staring at the RAPE case. Certain medical venues aside, I have trouble swallowing a scene like that, even for 1974.When she's in the stirrups, Montgomery asks about a uniformed police officer, "Does he have to be here?" "I'm afraid so," replies the doc, while permitting the officer to stand in a location that allows him to see her in her obstetric aspect. Pointless humiliation piled upon pointless humiliation. That's ridiculous.It doesn't improve when she's interviewed by two detectives. They seem barely interested and treat her with disdain and sometimes sarcasm. They challenge her on simple points. Is she sure it was the same man both times? "Getting hit with a rape charge is a terrible thing to do to a man." The prosecutor explains that her sex life will be on trial in open court, while the perp's previous arrests for rape can't be mentioned. Does she really want to put herself through it? As the weak husband, Cox is no help at all. He can't give her any advice. Moreover he can't get the rape behind him and is impotent. It gets worse. He begins to doubt her story. The trial is unable to avoid some of the usual clichés. Montgomery leaps to her feet on the witness stand and screams, "Lies! All LIES!" The script is unsparing.None of these criticisms of the film mitigates the horror associated with rape.

Liz Montgomery, who doesn't seem capable of a dishonest performance, really pulls out all the stops in this Movie of the Week from '74 that pulls no punches, literally or metaphorically.What makes her performance so fantastic is how repressed, pain filled, and thus realistic it is. It's almost hard to watch at times. A less accomplished actress would be tempted many, many times to go for the over-the-top hysterical money shot. She works up to it at the end, but she earns every bit of it.Ronny Cox and William Daniels give visceral, vivid supporting performances, the directing is journeyman competent and the script is raw, unforgiving, and immediate in its urgency.It's hard to imagine a less cozy movie about our legal system and some of the archaic laws that still drive it...kudos to all involved who brought a really bright light to a horrendous system of injustice that, hopefully with the advent of rape shielding laws and DNA testing, will be less needed in the future. Still, this film contains a lot of very valid lessons in protecting oneself that are helpful even today. Highly recommended...catch it on YouTube.

A few months before this film came out, a very similar film called Cry Rape was broadcast on C.B.S.. However, while that film has long since been forgotten, this film is still remembered as being one of the most groundbreaking films to ever grace the small screen. This is one of those films that come out that helped to make a difference. Before this film was released, few people knew how rape victims were really treated and the indignities that they suffered. This film showed that and more. Elizabeth Montgomery proved that she could do more than just play everyone's favorite witch Samantha Stephens. She took a chance with a very taboo subject and helped to make this one of the most acclaimed films of the early 1970's.

Elizabeth Montgomery plays a rape victim who, when going for help, is further abused by the court system. This movie broke every rule in Hollywood and just portrayed it as it really was, and as is today in many cases. If this would have been a theatrical film, Elizabeth Montgomery would have won an Oscar. She was nominated for an Emmy, but lost out to Cicely Tyson's role in "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman." While Tyson is good in the role, I feel the Emmy should have gone to Elizabeth Montgomery. Her performance blows away everything then and now on television. I wish since her tragic passing that she be given an honorary Emmy and be presented to her husband. Surprisingly, this is not been made available on video.