In the 1962 film, To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch, a Depression-era Southern lawyer, defends a black man, Tom Robinson, that he doesn't deserve the rape charge he's facing. Finch has a difficult job to do in defending a black man, but with his experience in the courtroom and the evidence provided, he manages to make this innocent gentleman win. The trial scene is the first climax of the film. Because of this it has a lot of depth and meaning (The Trial). According to the victim, Mayella Ewell, she was on the porch, minding her own business, when Robinson walked by. Mayella asked Tom to cut up a robe and make it into firewood. Her father, Bob Ewell, had asked her to do it, but she wasn't strong enough. When Tom was finished, he went to get him a penny to pay for the job. When he turned, he threw himself at her. “She is a victim of cruel poverty and ignorance. But my pity does not extend to the point of putting a man's life on the line, which he did in an attempt to rid himself of his guilt. Now I say "guilt", gentlemen, because it was guilt that motivated her. He has not committed any crime. He has simply broken a rigid, time-honored code of our society, a code so severe that anyone who breaks it is persecuted by us as unfit to live with” (American). Because Mayella grew up in a home with little money and little education, fun was scarce and the workload was quite heavy. He asked Tom Robinson to cut down his closet for firewood. Being a short girl, this seemed to be a difficult job. However, a completed task wasn't the only thing he wanted. She wanted love and attention from an attractive young man, even though it was against society's code of conduct. Finch lets the count's office know that he has no mercy for her because she is simply trying to rid herself of the guilt she feels for accusing an innocent man of the unthinkable..