Justice Denied

SARA is the evocative and powerful story of a young woman, Sara, who was sexually and physically assaulted five years ago in Los Angeles. Sara traces her journey from Saudi Arabia to Los Angeles and describes her struggles adapting to contemporary adolescent American life. As the story unfolds, we witness her coming to terms with the psychological effects of the assault, her addictive vices, and the highly contemptuous response to her assault by law enforcement officers. Done without cutaways, the film's form is experimental in nature and conveys the feeling of a one-woman theater work. Directed by Sara and Mitchell Block and Produced by Block with Yimin Gu and Anja Block, the work expands the documentary form. There will be over 400,000 of these assaults in the United States this year - fewer than 6,000 people will go to prison as a result. SARA shows why most of these crimes are never prosecuted, yet, for example, 98% of all bank robbers in the US are caught and most go to jail.