Ethics

Can you make a living being honest  Should you fight injustice or should you just give up and be a teacher instead After only one case, a rookie lawyer eventually feels the pressure and faces the corrupt, unjust real world, where lions, panthers, tigers and cheetahs prey on the weak.  He gets romantically involved with a beautiful client who gets him into more trouble than he thinks, as Samson is subdued by Delilah.  In the end, instead of fighting it out, he surrenders the battle and runs away with his lovely client and becomes an ethics teacher.  This is what Francis Ford Coppolas The Rainmaker is all about.  Produced in 1997, this suspense drama captures the unfair and unethical practices of the real world.

The world is unjust.  After graduating from the University of Memphis Law School, Rudy Baylor believes that wrongs should be corrected with what is right.  But he is forced to serve drinks in a bar and to search for part-time work to pay off his student loans because unlike his fellow successful graduates, he doesnt have high-placed connections to work for a prestigious firm.  With no other choice, he becomes an ambulance-chaser and searches for clients in hospitals. But some people doubt the ethical practices of lawyers who defend child molesters, rapists and murderers.  His employer is eventually raided by the FBI, and he has to set up his own practice with his partner Deck Shifflet, a paralegal who failed the bar exam six times.  Their first case is against an insurance company which denied a bone marrow transplant to a man suffering from leukemia.  He faces experienced corrupt lawyers who almost dismiss the case, but through sheer determination, Rudy wins it.  Unfortunately, the insurance company decides to declare bankruptcy to avoid payment.  So Rudy and his client receive nothing.  Meanwhile, during the case, Rudy is attracted to Kelly Riker, a lovely young woman who is the victim of her husband Cliffs beatings.  His involvement eventually leads to confrontation and the death of Cliff, but Kelly covers up Rudys involvement and the district attorney doesnt prosecute.  In the end, his failure in his first case leads him to quit his law practice and become an ethics teacher.  He also moves out of town with Kelly, protecting her from Cliffs relatives.  The movie leads one to believe that justice doesnt prevail, and being emotionally-charged to fight what is wrong may actually make you commit crimes yourself.  Being a teacher seems to be more practical.

And in the scene where Kelly covers up Rudy for the death of Cliff, it can be seen that good and bad are just two sides of the same coin.  By being too passionate about fighting evil and doing what is good, Rudy didnt realize that good can also become evil while evil lawyers can also do good.

I think that in the end, we can actually avoid swinging to the other side of the pendulum by being moderate.  The movie shows what seems to be hopelessness because the reactions of Rudy are extreme.  While this may be the reaction of some people in the real world, others who are more moderate will continue fighting injustice.  Like Deck who did not quit after failing the bar exam six times, Rudy would not have quite after his first case if he lowered his expectations.  Its a jungle out there.  Thats a given that everyone should know.  As Buddha says, life is dukkha (an impermanent cycle of suffering and injustice).  He also should have controlled his emotions, specially his love for Kelly, who is a potential client.  There should be no romantic involvement with clients because love is like a drug that can drive you mad.

In conclusion, The Rainmaker presents what seems to be the hopeless case of an unjust world.  However, as Buddhas Fourth Noble Truth preaches the Middle Way, a moderate approach to its issues will solve its problems--not perfectly, as nothing is perfect, but in a more practical and achievable way.