Absence of Malice

“In America can a man be guilty until proven innocent?”

In a newsroom where a federal prosecutor can slide a leaked file across a desk, reporter Megan Carter (Sally Field) prints a story naming Michael Gallagher (Paul Newman), the son of a dead mobster, as the suspect in a labor leader's disappearance. Sydney Pollack follows Gallagher as he walks in on her, calm and polite, with an alibi that would hurt someone else. Carter keeps filing, still trusting her sources, and the cost of getting it wrong lands on her.