Witness



Witness is a 1985 film directed by Peter Weir and starring Harrison Ford, who earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. Also starring Kelly McGillis, Lukas Haas and Danny Glover.

Samuel Lapp is a young Amish boy journeying to Baltimore to visit an aunt with his mother, the recently widowed Rachel Lapp. Samuel is the witness when two men kill an undercover officer in a Philadelphia train station bathroom. Detective John Book takes the boy into custody to protect him when it turns out that the killers are crooked narcotics cops. After a shootout, Book is wounded and hides with the Lapps on their farm, and ends up developing a relationship with Rachel as he recovers, adapting to the Amish lifestyle and being tentatively accepted by the community. But their idyllic lifestyle is soon shattered once the villains figure out where they went and descend upon the unsuspecting Amish town with their guns.


 * Amish
 * An Aesop: The film depicts violence as never being the answer and depicts it unpleasantly and having negative consequences. As satisfying as it may be to the viewer, Book angrily punching the Jerkass tourist who was bullying Daniel is what allows Schaeffer to track him down. At the opposite end, the movie, by this same logic, avoids having Book kill in favor of a nonviolent conclusion.
 * Barn Raising: Probably the film's most famous scene.
 * Big Damn Heroes: The Amish.
 * But Now I Must Go: Book, at the end.
 * Chekhov's Gun: The grain silo.
 * Cool Old Guy: Eli Lapp.
 * The Dragon: McFee.
 * Even Evil Has Standards: This is how the Amish win through nonviolence.
 * Fire-Forged Friends: In the most pacifistic example of this trope, Book and Daniel. While Daniel is a Nice Guy in general, he makes it perfectly clear he doesn't like Book, more or less because of Rachel's interest in the latter. Nevertheless, they work together in the barn raisng, sharing a glass of lemonade with each other during their break. When Daniel is being harassed by tourists, he tries to convince Book to stay out of it, but when Book punches the tourists, he could barely contain his glee. Even vouching for him when an older tourist asks where Book came from.
 * Foot Focus: The female lead washing her feet (and the rest of herself), quickly followed by more generic Fan Service.
 * Gondor Calls for Aid: The Amish often keep to themselves and their work unless they perform a task that requires the whole community to work together. The key example being the Barn Raising scene. However when Sam alerts them of the danger regarding the crooked cops after him, Rachel, Eli and Book, they all drop what they are doing and show up.
 * Gratuitous German: The Amish. Sometimes mangled to the point of being unintelligible, but possibly justified by the Amish being an isolated community that has very little (if any) contact to other German speakers and also speaks English most of the time.
 * He Knows Too Much
 * Heroic BSOD: Book has a couple. Notably, this is the reason he finally hauls off and punches out the tourist picking on Daniel:.
 * I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Book's reason for leaving. He knows Daniel will make a better husband for Rachel and father for Samuel.
 * Jerkass: Those redneck tourists in town who harass the Amish.
 * Just a Flesh Wound: Brutally subverted. Book is badly hit and only barely survives getting shot in the stomach by McFee.
 * Parental Substitute: On top of being Sam's protector, John Book serves as this for him. Sam shows him the lay of the land in his village whilst Book in turn builds a toy for him.
 * Perfect Pacifist People: The Amish. They still come to the rescue at the end, though, in their own way.
 * Punch Clock Villain: Schaeffer has a family and doesn't seem as vicious as his two overzealous henchmen.
 * Put Down Your Gun and Step Away: Done twice. First by Schaeffer to Book when he has Rachel hostage, and later by the Amish to Schaeffer.
 * Scary Black Man: McFee.
 * Star-Crossed Lovers: Rachel and Book. Their relationship is pretty much doomed from the get-go.
 * Would Hurt a Child: Played with and subverted. Schaeffer initially seems hellbent on killing Samuel for witnessing the murder but