There are many instances in A Time to Kill in which empathy comes into play, both real and apparent. The film is largely based off of the emotional struggles in the court room, along with the emotional stresses of Jake and the other characters. However, Jake’s closing speech is a particularly extreme empathy-invoking moment in the story.

The entirety of Jake’s closing speech is focused on the element of sympathy, pity, and empathy. He describes the rape of Carle Lee Hailey’s daughter, putting a face to the victim, and not only a face, but a face the jurors could find in their own family: the face of their child. Jake starts with an apology: “I am young, and I am inexperienced. But you cannot hold Carl Lee Hailey responsible for my shortcomings.” (A Time to Kill 2:13:41 — 2:13:51). With his admittance to his faults, Jake immediately seems less like an attorney, but another human being; someone everyone can relate to. He makes both the audience and the jurors see him for the person he is outside of the courtroom: a local boy, their neighbour, and somebody with struggles, a family, and regrets. Jake continues to break down the wall between juror and attorney, and creates an atmosphere of transparency and familiarity in the court room by explaining what his job as a lawyer entails, how he strives to find the truth. He is direct about the issues prevalent in their culture. “I set out to prove a black man could get a fair trial in the South. That we are all equal in the eyes of the law. That’s not the truth. Because the eyes of the law are human eyes; yours and mine, and until we can see each other as equals, justice is never going to be even handed.” (A Time to Kill 2:15:01 – 2:15:20) He points out how they cannot escape the judgements of their beliefs, and since they cannot see each other as equals, they should judge “not with [their] eyes, not with [their] minds…, but with [their] hearts.” (A Time to Kill 2:15:30 – 2:15:40). The biggest call for empathy from Jake comes after, however. It comes when he tells the story of Hailey’s young daughter’s rape. As he recounts the details, from the way the rapists grabbed her and tied her up on her way back home from the grocery store, to the details of her rape, he paints a scenario that does not depend on race. He depicts a situation that could happen to any of the audience’s beloved children, a scene is bound to pull on the heartstrings of any parent. Jake invokes extreme pity for the girl, forcing all the parents into the mindset of Carle Lee Hailey; making them understand how he must have felt. Jake makes the jurors empathize with Carle Lee Hailey and think that for their child, they would have done the same. He ends his moving speech with “now, imagine she’s white” (A Time to Kill 2:20:20 – 2:20:24), successfully morphing the image of Hailey’s daughter into the image of their own white children.

Overall, A Time to Kill plays on empathy as much as the depiction of life as an attorney, as can be distinguished through the empathetic closing speech Jake delivers at court, acquitting Carle Lee Hailey. Throughout the entire movie, we as the audience are moved to feel pity, alarm, fear, and sympathy for the misfortunes the characters live through. As we see life through the eyes of attorney Jake Brigance, we end up empathizing both with his situation, along with the unfortunate circumstances of the people around him.

Works Cited

Schumacher, Joel, Director. A Time to Kill. Regency Enterprises, 1996.

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