"What price justice?"

Rating: 10/10 (3 February 2018)

"What price justice when justice was not served the first-time round?" This is the question proposed and was explored by the movie through smart black humor and irony. Given we as species are both blessed and cursed with a sense of moral right and wrong and given our world is imperfect where crime do not necessarily meet with their just retributions, we as individuals take matters into our own hand. This is where things get complicated. For one, is there a pay forward system in retribution meaning it is transferrable if the crime fits a generic similarity? Or in the name of justice, equality puts crime of the same into a cesspool of the same where if the retribution is good for the goose, it will also be good for the gander. After all, the satisfaction from seeing justice can also be transferrable from one case to another. It is a question of whether retribution should be case specific, or it doesn't matter. This puts impartiality, the essence of the blindfold on Lady Justice into a new "funny" limelight. On irony, there is also the irony of polar difference in attitudes towards crime. The Willoughby's realistic pragmatism that is lined with a fuzzy human touch vs the Mildred Hayes's undaunting iron will and fist of wanting justice served. They are two sides of the same coin because and this may be a surprise for some for in my opinion, they are both pivotal characters showing the two different types of human nature and human nature is what gives rise to our moral awareness, the foundation of justice. The surprise for some lies in my opinion about Mildred Hayes. For though she took center stage in the movie, she is not the protagonist of the show. The real protagonist of the show is Dixon. The catharsis that came to him, which literally changed him through a "baptism of fire" is when his potential of being good is acknowledged by his best buddy and mentor, Mr. Willoughby in the letter that he wrote him. Of course, later, the orange juice from the mangled Red Welby also helped to seal a new-found faith in the good side of humanity for him. As to whether justice is transferrable or not, or whether the true culprit of the heinous rape crime against Mildred's daughter is apprehended or not is relatively immaterial for both Mildred and Dixon will have some time after the end of the movie to talk about these things on their way to Idaho.