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Note. Some spoilers may follow.

The September 2026 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) hosted the world premiere of Prima Facie, a screen adaptation of the Tony Award- and Olivier Award-winning play of the same name. The film stars Oscar-nominated Cynthia Erivo as Tessa Ensler, a criminal defence barrister in the heart of London’s legal core, who has built a reputation for her skillful arguments and strong courtroom presence.

Tessa begins the film with immense trust in the criminal justice system and relies on the law to ensure the process, the rules, and the burden of proof hold up no matter who stands on which side. Jurisprudence sustains her faith in legal formalism, the belief that the law is objective, irrespective of broader social contexts, and helps her navigate the merciless and adversarial trials surrounding sexual assault and violent crime. This changes when she discovers how flawed and misogynistic the justice system is when she herself becomes the victim of rape, standing on the other side of the courtroom as one of the few women to speak up.

The film is brilliantly written and tactfully directed, weaving together themes of power, privilege, bias, and toxic masculinity, alongside the despair that follows a sexual assault socially, emotionally, and psychologically. The film depicts the sad reality of how........

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