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| “ | You look closely enough, you'll find that everything has a weak spot where it can break, sooner or later. | „ |
| ~ Crawford's most famous line. |
| “ | It doesn't matter what you do now. It doesn't matter what you know. I mean, she could come back from the dead, you see, and testify, spill the beans, and it would mean... nothing. So you can't touch me... ever. | „ |
| ~ Crawford gloating about getting away with his wife's murder. |
Ted Crawford is the main antagonist of the crime drama Fracture. He's the prime suspect of the shooting of his wife, proving to be a deceitful opponent in court for the protagonist of the film, Willy Beachum, the prosecutor on his case, especially when his colleagues are personally pulled into the trial as part of the setup.
He was portrayed by Anthony Hopkins, who also played Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal, and Red Dragon, Henry Wilcox in Howards End, Ian McCandless in Freejack, Sir John Talbot in The Wolfman, Edward Bailey in RED 2, Fats in Magic, and Robert Ford in Westworld.
Biography[]
Crawford, an Irish, high-class aeronautics engineer, after finding out his wife, Jennifer, is in an affair with detective Robert Nunally, confronts her and shoots in the head, leaving her clinging to life. When Nunally's called and has both of them put their guns down, Crawford openly confesses to the attempted murder, showing his wife on the floor. Nunally's so horrified and scarred, and with enough continued verbal provocation from Crawford, he sees red and and beats Crawford senseless.
District attorney William "Willy" Beachum is confident about the case and ready to go to trial to boost his career in corporate legalities. But Crawford, representing himself, puts up a hard fight, challenging Nunally's affair and assault and assuming "tampering" when being present in interrogation. By "fruit from the poisonous tree" legal clause, Crawford's confession is quickly tossed. What's even more a shock is his gun has never been fired, let alone doesn't match the shell casings at the scene, thus could never be the murder weapon, despite CCTV footage on the side of the prosecution. Talking down Nunally's attempt to tamper with evidence, Beachum is shocked by the hard blow of Crawford's acquittal in court. Out of the loss if his mistress and public defamation, Nunally goes onto the court steps and kills himself with his own gun.
Beachum, with his chances for progression shattered to pieces, presses in the case for the sake of justice, which Crawford flatly refers to as "[finding] God". He realizes Crawford wants his own wife Jennifer to be eliminated, but he fails to prevent her life support being turned off.
Mixed-up phone calls makes Beachum come up with the epiphany of realizing Crawford and Nunally use the same guns. He soon finds to his horror Nunally's gun was the one used to kill Jennifer, stolen and swapped with Crawford's gun at Nunally's and Jennifer's favorite hotel room, the switch back made during the confrontation at Crawford's house. Crawford deliberately came out with his own gun to provoke the assault, on top of Nunally's grief and trauma. Beachum has the ballistics tested in Nunally's gun once the bullet in Jennifer's head is retrived now that she's dead, and it's an instant match. Beachum confidently yet solemnly confronts Crawford. Playing off his hubris, he gets Crawford to make a full confession. Crawford assumes "double jeopardy" in the case, but Beachum rubs in his face the trial was for attempted murder. They're now ready to gladly try him for murder as he deliberately arranged the removal of Jennifer's life support. With this revelation, Crawford, now the horrified one, is arrested by accompanying police. The film ends with Beachum staying in his job and ready to prosecute Crawford again, Crawford represented by a barrage of attorneys from Wooden Simms, the firm Beachum lost his chance at joining.
Personality[]
Ted Crawford is shown from the beginning to be very meticulous and detail-oriented, as he examines a x-ray of a broken aircraft part and circling a precise part of it, assuming it was the origin of the failure. He also tells Beachum that when he was young, his grandfather tasks him to find failure with his eggs and that he finds that in all of these. He has a good knowledge of the judicial system, representing himself during his first trial and succeeding to get himself acquitted of attempted murder. He is nevertheless a psychopath because he has no hesitation shooting his wife Jennifer in cold-blood without remorse. His insecurity and narcissistic superiority complex shows in the petty motive of retribution for infidelity. In addition, the facts that he orders the death of her at the hospital without reason and that he provokes Nunally, knowing his future reaction, shows that he is willing to be evil just for the sake of it, as well as plans for fully capitalizing off the affects with willing intention.
However, he is also arrogant and that proves to be his downfall. Having won his trial, he believed himself to be untouchable by double jeopardy and that leads him to take the decision to plug off his wife from life's support. But his arrogance made him overlook the fact that attempted murder and murder are two different crimes and when Beachum makes him realize that, he is absolutely frightened. He's also heavily passionate about strategy and chain reactions, as shown in his board games like chess and his kinetic rolling ball machines. With this proudly displayed in his home, and flaunted during his court case and after his acquittal, he thrives off pairing it with his own sadism and senses of superiority.
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