Amanda Knox, de Amerikaanse vrouw die in 2007 werd veroordeeld voor de moord op een medestudente in Italië en later werd vrijgesproken, heeft zich op Twitter uitgesproken tegen Stillwater van regisseur Tom McCarthy (Spotlight).

De film is geïnspireerd door Knox’ verhaal en gaat over een vader (Matt Damon) die de onschuld van zijn dochter (Abigail Breslin) in een Franse moordzaak probeert te bewijzen.

Volgens Knox wordt er al jaren zonder haar toestemming van haar naam, gezicht en verhaal geprofiteerd, terwijl ze eigenlijk niets met de moord te maken had.

Wat Stillwater betreft, haalt Knox een interview met McCarthy in Vanity Fair aan waarin hij zegt dat hij zich afvroeg hoe het moest voelen om in haar schoenen te staan. “Hij heeft het me echter nooit gevraagd,” tweet ze.

“Tom McCarthy was naar eigen zeggen geïnteresseerd in mijn familie, wie me kwam bezoeken in de gevangenis en de band die ik met hen had,” vervolgt ze. “Daar heb ik veel over te zeggen en ik zou het hem gezegd hebben, moest hij me ooit hebben gecontacteerd.”

Verder zei McCarthy dat hij de zaak Amanda Knox wilde loslaten en zich enkel baseren op het deel waarin ‘een Amerikaanse vrouw die in het buitenland studeert betrokken raakt bij een sensationele misdaad’. Alles errond wilde hij verzinnen.

“Daar gaat mijn verhaal echter niet over,” tweet Knox. “Het gaat over een Amerikaanse vrouw die niet betrokken was bij een sensationele misdaad en toch onterecht werd veroordeeld.”

“Als je de zaak Amanda Knox wil loslaten en alles errond wil verzinnen, dan moet je misschien ook mijn naam niet gebruiken om de film te promoten,” vervolgt ze. “Je laat de zaak Amanda Knox niet echt achter je als ik in elke recensie word aangehaald.”

Knox verklapt ook het einde van de film – SPOILERALARM – waarin blijkt dat Breslins personage onrechtstreeks bij de moord betrokken was.

“Men blijft beweren dat ik iets verberg of dat ik op een of andere manier iets met de moord te maken had,” schrijft Knox. “McCarthy voedt het idee dat ik schuldig en onbetrouwbaar ben.”

This new film by director Tom McCarthy, starring Matt Damon, is “loosely based” or “directly inspired by” the “Amanda Knox saga,” as Vanity Fair put it in a for-profit article promoting a for-profit film, neither of which I am affiliated with.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

It refers to the shoddy police work, prosecutorial tunnel vision, and refusal to admit their mistakes that led the Italian authorities to wrongfully convict me, twice. In those four years of wrongful imprisonment and 8 years of trial, I had near-zero agency.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

This focus on me led many to complain that Meredith had been forgotten. But of course, who did they blame for that? Not the Italian authorities. Not the press. Me! Somehow it was my fault that the police and media focused on me at Meredith’s expense.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

In the wake of #metoo, more people are coming to understand how power dynamics shape a story. Who had the power in the relationship between Bill Clinton and @MonicaLewinsky? The president or the intern?

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

I would love nothing more than for people to refer to the events in Perugia as “The murder of Meredith Kercher by Rudy Guede,” which would place me as the peripheral figure I should have been, the innocent roommate.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

Don’t blame me for the fact that others put the focus on me instead of Meredith. And when you refer to these events, understand that how you talk about it affects the people involved: Meredith’s family, my family, @Raffasolaries, and me.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

And if you must refer to the “Amanda Knox saga,” maybe don’t call it, as the @nytimes did in profiling Matt Damon, “the sordid Amanda Knox saga.” Sordid: morally vile. Not a great adjective to have placed next to your name. Repeat something often enough, and people believe it.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

A few years ago, there was the Fox series Proven Innocent (@InnocentOnFOX) which was developed and marketed as “What if Amanda Knox became a lawyer?” The first I heard from the show’s makers was when they had the audacity to ask me to help them promote it on the eve of its debut. pic.twitter.com/G31inSWK7E

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

To his credit, Gladwell responded to my critiques over email, and was gracious enough to join me on my podcast, Labyrinths. https://t.co/hh4M9jMeoy

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

#STILLWATER was “directly inspired by the Amanda Knox saga.” Director Tom McCarthy tells Vanity Fair, “he couldn’t help but imagine how it would feel to be in Knox’s shoes.” …But that didn’t inspire him to ask me how it felt to be in my shoes.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

“We decided, ‘Hey, let’s leave the Amanda Knox case behind,’” McCarthy tells Vanity Fair. “But let me take this piece of the story—an American woman studying abroad involved in some kind of sensational crime and she ends up in jail—and fictionalize everything around it.”

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

And if you’re going to “leave the Amanda Knox case behind,” and “fictionalize everything around it,” maybe don’t use my name to promote it. You’re not leaving the Amanda Knox case behind very well if every single review mentions me.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

But, all this I mostly forgive. I get it. There’s money to be made, and you have no obligation to approach me. What I’m more bothered by is how this film, “directly inspired by the Amanda Knox saga, “fictionalizes” me and this story.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

In the film, the character based on me gives a tip to her father to help find the man who really killed her friend. Matt Damon tracks him down. This fictionalizing erases the corruption and ineptitude of the authorities.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

McCarthy told Vanity Fair that “Stillwater’s ending was inspired not by the outcome of Knox’s case, but by the demands of the script he and his collaborators had created.” Cool, so I wonder, is the character based on me actually innocent?

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

I continue to be accused of “knowing something I’m not revealing,” of “having been involved somehow, even if I didn’t plunge the knife.” So Tom McCarthy’s fictionalized version of me is just the tabloid conspiracy guilter version of me.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

And with Matt Damon’s star power, both are sure to profit handsomely off of this fictionalization of “the Amanda Knox saga” that is sure to leave plenty of viewers wondering, “Maybe the real-life Amanda was involved somehow.”

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

He didn’t plunge the knife per se, but he’s definitely at fault somehow. His name is Damien Matthews, and he starred in the Jackson Burne spy films. He works with Tim McClatchy, who’s a Harvey Weinstein type. It’s loosely based on reality. Shouldn't bother Matt or Tom, right?

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

I bet we could have a fascinating conversation about identity, and public perception, and who should get to exploit a name, face, and story that has entered the public imagination.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

I went back to school and fellow students photographed me surreptitiously, people who lived in my apartment building invented stories for the tabloids, I worked a minimum wage job at a used bookstore, only to be confronted by stalkers at the counter.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

I have not been allowed to return to the relative anonymity I had before Perugia. My only option is to sit idly by while others continue to distort my character, or fight to restore my good reputation that was wrongfully destroyed.

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

If you're an @Medium reader, you can find this all here:https://t.co/WFsM5WNnZ1

— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) July 29, 2021

Bron: EW