![\"Karl](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/a4f8ff87c18a5cd77f68e2e5bec557af09704ee24d7ae5e480221fbe9f8c0dfa.png\")
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January 27, 2026 \u2014 4:37pm<\/p>\n
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Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n Save this article for later<\/p>\n Add articles to your saved list and come back to them anytime.<\/p>\n Got it<\/p>\n AAA<\/p>\n One of the biggest risks in making a film about how the law is used to prevent women from speaking up about sexual abuse is that someone will try to use the law to prevent the film from being shown.<\/p>\n Predictably, a legal warning has already been sent to the makers of Silenced, which has just made its debut at Sundance Film Festival, where it is one of two Australian films in competition among 10 in the documentary showcase strand (the other is Sentient, in which former Q+A host Tony Jones examines the use of animals in laboratory testing).<\/p>\n Among the women interviewed in the film are Amber Heard, who was drawn into defamation suits in both the UK and the US after alleging she was violently abused by former husband Johnny Depp during their marriage, and Brittany Higgins, the former Liberal Party staffer who was raped in Canberra\u2019s Parliament House in 2019.<\/p>\n On Monday, The Australian reported<\/a> that lawyers for Linda Reynolds, the former Liberal senator and minister and Higgins\u2019 former boss, had sent a letter to the film\u2019s producers threatening defamation action should the documentary suggest their client in any way attempted to prevent Higgins from airing her complaint.<\/p>\n \u201cIf, as the synopsis suggests, the film contains any allegation that our client or her staff attempted to \u2018silence\u2019 Ms Higgins, or is in any other way defamatory of our client, our client will take legal action against [production company] Stranger Than Fiction Films Pty Ltd, [sales agent] Together Films and, if necessary, individuals such as the director and producers who have participated,\u201d the letter from Bennett Law reportedly said.<\/p>\n The filmmakers confirmed to this masthead that they had received the legal warning from Reynolds. This masthead does not suggest that Reynolds sought to silence Higgins or to shut down the film.<\/p>\n Human rights lawyer Jennifer Robinson \u2013 whose 2022 book How Many More Women? How the Law Silences Women inspired the film \u2013 says you could hardly ask for a better illustration of how fraught this terrain is.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s legally difficult to tell these stories \u2013 the fact we\u2019ve received a legal threat proves the point,\u201d Australian-born, London-based Robinson says. \u201cBut it\u2019s so important that we do tell these stories, and we have to make it easier to tell them.\u201d<\/p>\n Robinson\u2019s book (co-authored with Keio Yoshida) examines the myriad ways the legal system can be deployed to silence women, including NDAs (non-disclosure agreements), the favoured tool of Harvey Weinstein<\/a> over years of alleged abuse. But the film, directed by Selina Miles, focuses on a handful of high-profile cases that reached court \u2013 largely because they are, by definition, visible and in the public domain.<\/p>\n Still, it was no small thing to convince the much-maligned Heard and the now-bankrupt Higgins (thanks to a successful defamation action brought by Reynolds) to once again recount their experiences on camera.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not here to tell my story. I don\u2019t want to tell my story,\u201d says Heard in the film. \u201cIn fact, I don\u2019t even want to use my voice any more. That\u2019s the problem.\u201d Heard and Depp engaged in two major defamation cases: a libel case in the UK in 2020, which Depp lost, and a 2022 case in the US, in which the jury largely found in his favour.<\/p>\n Higgins, who attended the premiere in Sundance as a guest of the producers (as did Robinson and Colombian journalist Catalina Navarro Kirner, another case study and interviewee), cuts a wounded figure in Silenced.<\/p>\n She says that since making her complaint against Bruce Lehrmann in 2021, she has been through four government reviews, a criminal trial, a civil trial, a government inquiry into the police conduct in the case, and \u201ccountless civil suits that have flown around\u201d. Federal Court Justice Michael Lee concluded to the civil standard \u2013 on the balance of probabilities \u2013 that Lehrmann raped Higgins in Parliament House in March 2019, as part of a multimillion-dollar defamation case<\/a> that Lehrmann brought against Network Ten and journalist Lisa Wilkinson and lost.<\/p>\n In addition to what one might term the formal side of the case, there is also the enormous burden of intense media scrutiny (much of it critical of her testimony) and social media abuse. Little wonder, then, that Higgins describes herself as \u201cjust really tired\u201d, and says of bringing her complaint: \u201cI don\u2019t know if it was the right decision for me.\u201d<\/p>\n The legal challenges in making the film \u2013 and ensuring it can be shown (a long series of end titles does its best to ensure no defamation suits can be brought against the film, by anyone who is mentioned) \u2013 are real. But, says Robinson, \u201cit\u2019s also emotionally very challenging for the women involved.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m so grateful to them for using their voice in this project,\u201d she says, \u201cso we can use the film for a much bigger cultural conversation about how we treat women who speak out in the online space, in the media, in the courts, and what needs to change.\u201d<\/p>\n Silenced will be released in Australia mid-year.<\/p>\n Save<\/p>\n You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n![\"Human](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/10d608728943c85b6e42d36dcc08ffb4706d58bb.jpeg\")
Human rights lawyer Jennifer Robinson in court in a scene from the Australian documentary Silenced, which debuted at Sundance in January 2026.\u00a0Michael Latham<\/p>\n![\"Robinson,](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2ceadefecee0a8d27a7e428312b465978bb2b26c.jpeg\")
Robinson, right, with Amber Heard outside court in London in 2020.AP<\/p>\n![\"Brittany](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/e5f19b3599610ca8c8cbe1d0152075c9424f2ee3.jpeg\")
Brittany Higgins with husband David Sharaz at the premiere of Silenced in Park City, Utah.Getty Images<\/p>\n