Movie Review

'On the Basis of Sex' fails to do Ruth Bader Ginsburg's life story justice

There's little imagination in this cinematic take on the early years of the revered US Supreme Court justice's legal career

27 January 2019 - 00:00 By tymon smith

For Democrats and US liberals, the 85-year-old Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is the last bastion of reason standing against the moral tyranny and insanity of Trump-era radical Republicanism.
As the second female justice appointed to the bench of the US's highest judicial body, Ginsburg has made a career of fighting against sexism and for the equal rights of women. She has fought for these causes ever since she walked into a predominantly male Harvard law class in the 1950s, and through the 1970s when she argued against and helped dismantle several archaic and restrictive laws preventing the equal treatment of women in US society, before she was appointed to the court in 1993.
If you've seen last year's excellent documentary RBG (a tribute to the nickname young Americans have given her - "the Notorious RBG") you'll know that Ginsburg is a lifelong opera devotee, workaholic and gym enthusiast, whose tiny frame holds within it a dogged devotion to the law and a fundamental belief in its protective and enfranchising powers...

There’s never been a more important time to support independent media.

From World War 1 to present-day cosmopolitan South Africa and beyond, the Sunday Times has been a pillar in covering the stories that matter to you.

For just R80 you can become a premium member (digital access) and support a publication that has played an important political and social role in South Africa for over a century of Sundays. You can cancel anytime.

Already subscribed? Sign in below.



Questions or problems? Email helpdesk@timeslive.co.za or call 0860 52 52 00.