SOURCE: Bruzzi, Stella. Review of The People vs. Larry Flynt, by Milos Forman. Sight and Sound 7, no. 3 (March 1997): 58-9.

In the following review, Bruzzi argues that Forman glosses over the darker side of Larry Flynt's persona in The People vs. Larry Flynt, therefore lessening the importance of Flynt's First Amendment battles with the U.S. Supreme Court.

Kentucky, 1952. Two boys, one of them Larry Flynt, manufacture and sell moonshine liquor. Twenty years later, Larry is running the Hustler go-go club, where he meets Althea Leasure, a dancer he later marries, after the Hustler ‘newsletter’ has become a commercial porn magazine and made him a millionaire. In 1972 Larry is arrested on charges of pandering obscenity and organised crime, and is defended by Alan Isaacman, who represents him in all his courtroom battles.

At his first trial, Larry is found guilty and sentenced to 25 years, but is cleared five months...