Absence of Malice

Absence of Malice (1981) is a sharp American drama about journalism and accountability you can watch online on iFILM. Director Sidney Pollack cast Paul Newman and Sally Field against each other — and the friction between them is what makes this 116-minute film worth sitting through four decades later.

Michael Gallagher is a liquor dealer who inherited nothing from his mob-boss father except the name. A desperate federal investigator leaks his name to the press as a suspect in an unsolved murder, hoping it will shake something loose. Reporter Megan Carter runs with the story without verifying it. Gallagher's reputation collapses overnight — and an innocent person close to him pays a much heavier price. Then Gallagher starts playing the system back.

Screenwriter Kurt Luedtke was a journalist himself, and the film never cheats by making the press simply villainous. Carter isn't malicious — she's ambitious and careless, which is exactly the point the tagline makes: "In America can a man be guilty until proven innocent?" Sally Field earned an Academy Award nomination here. Stream Absence of Malice (1981) on iFILM.