The real meaning

10 legal terms that are often misunderstood

The popularity of legal movies and TV shows has resulted in people becoming familiar with terms and concepts they wouldn’t know otherwise, but it has also contributed to some mistaken ideas about what some of these terms mean. Is a waiver just a simple permit? What does free speech really entail? When does something qualify as hearsay? Here are 10 legal concepts you’ve probably heard before but might not mean what you think they do.

As any American knows, freedom of speech is an inalienable right, guaranteed by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But what does this mean? Freedom where or from whom? Many interpret this right as a freedom to express their mind everywhere and anywhere, but this is not exactly correct. Free speech is the guarantee we have as citizens that the government cannot censor, restrain, or interfere with our free and public expression. When it comes to private establishments and contexts, or to speech that might lead to harm to others, the right to free speech is not absolute.

Slander is a form of defamation, that is, damaging someone’s reputation by spreading false statements about them. But are all forms of defamation the same? There are many ways to spread false information or statements, but the law makes two main distinctions: whether or not it’s recorded or written down. While "slander" is a term we might hear often in legal shows, it refers strictly to spoken defamation, meaning an oral remark or statement, or a broadcast that was not recorded. For anything written down, published, or recorded, the proper term is "libel".

Many people think that waivers are similar to permits, so signing a waiver would be akin to giving your consent for something. While a waiver requires consent, it is not a simple permit. As its name suggests, it implies waiving or giving away something. In this case, a right. If you sign a liability, contractual, or any other type of waiver, you are willingly giving up a known right, privilege, or claim, which cannot be invoked later.

Whether something was done with malice or not might be the difference between a lesser or greater charge, both in civil and criminal law. But what is malice? In its legal sense, malice is not ill will or evilness, but the intention to cause harm or do something illegal without cause or justification. While mitigating circumstances such as accidents or spontaneous emotion might result in a lesser charge, malice will always increase the severity of the situation.

You might have heard this term in relation to car insurance, workers’ compensation, or divorce and wondered if it meant that no one was responsible. While there might be situations where no one’s to blame, this is not what no-fault systems are about. In many legal cases, determining the responsible party is necessary to resolve the case or award compensation. In a no-fault system, however, the law focuses on resolving the dispute rather than assigning blame, settling matters without needing to prove who is responsible.

Affidavits are quite common in all sorts of legal procedures, but their use in TV shows might make them seem as something that is only used in court. An affidavit is a written statement that the signer swears to be true, under penalty of perjury, and that is signed in front of a notary who can verify their identity. While affidavits can be presented in court in replacement of in-person testimony, they are also used in business, financial matters, official applications, and many other proceedings.

In everyday talk, we understand "hearsay" as information that you heard from someone else and are unable to verify. Legally, hearsay is slightly different, as it refers to written or spoken statements made outside the court that are presented as evidence. As the person who made the statement is not present to swear their veracity, hearsay is usually not admissible as proof, but the court might decide to accept it anyway if the situation requires it.

Unlike civil cases, criminal cases require that guilt is proven beyond a reasonable doubt to convict the accused. But what is reasonable doubt? The law is not asking the jury or judge to be 100% certain or to not have any shred of doubt left, but that they are firmly convinced by the evidence presented, with no other logical explanation. If their common sense and the evidence (or lack thereof) make them hesitate or admit a logical alternative, it means that the case was not proven "beyond a reasonable doubt", in which case the law gives the accused the benefit of the doubt.

It is common for people to group burglary with other criminal acts such as theft or robbery, but it belongs in a separate category. While robbery or theft involve taking someone else’s property without consent (i.e., stealing), burglary is the act of entering a place illegally to commit a crime inside. Why is it commonly associated with stealing then? Because most burglary cases involve theft.

We are used to referring to most illegal acts as crimes or offenses, but these terms strictly belong to criminal law. When it comes to civil law, which deals with private wrongs towards people and their property, the correct term is "tort", defined as a wrongful act that causes harm, loss, or injury to another person and that leads to legal liability, meaning that the person who committed the act is held responsible, whether it was intentional or not.

Behind-the-scenes secrets

What do Star Wars and the Vatican have in common? Here's the answer

Image: Alvaro Palacios

There's a lot more to movies than what we see on the big screen. As viewers, we get to enjoy the finished product, but the amount of work that goes into making a film is huge. And along the way, plenty of surprising things happen on set—some you’d never imagine! From unscripted slaps to actors stepping in to save their co-stars' lives, here are 10 unusual behind-the-scenes moments from some of our favorite movies.

Image: Carrie Fisher (aka Princess Leia) by Gerald England

Dan Aykroyd is not only a renowned actor, comedian, screenwriter, and producer—he’s also a hero! In 1980, during the filming of the now-classic The Blues Brothers, something unexpected happened: Aykroyd literally saved Carrie Fisher's life by performing the Heimlich maneuver when she choked on a Brussels sprout.

Image: Toglenn, via Wikimedia Commons

Margot Robbie landed the role of Naomi in The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) on her very first audition. How? During a moment of improvisation, she delivered a hard, genuine slap to co-star Leonardo DiCaprio, totally surprising Martin Scorsese and securing the role. And she was only 22 at the time! Fortunately, Leo took it very well.

Image: Compare Fibre

You probably remember the enigmatic green code in The Matrix (1999). While it looks sophisticated and impossible to decipher, production designer Simon Whiteley revealed a surprising truth. In a 2017 interview, he explained that the code was actually inspired by a sushi recipe, created using the characters in a Japanese cookbook his wife had at home.

Image: Chad J. McNeeley, U.S. Navy, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

As we know, Schindler’s List is an emotionally difficult film to watch, and filming it was no easier. Director Steven Spielberg later shared that his friend, the great Robin Williams, would call him at least once a week to perform little comedy routines, helping him cope with the difficulty of directing the movie.

Image: Carlo Pelagalli, via Wikimedia Commons

What could the Star Wars universe and the Vatican possibly have in common? Well, in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999), one scene was filmed on the grand staircase of Italy's Royal Palace of Caserta. The very same location appears 25 years later in Conclave (2024), the film about the election of popes.

Image: Visualnarrative, via Wikimedia Commons

Some say things aren't as good as they used to be, especially when it comes to special effects. Remember "Edgar," the evil farmer whose skin is taken by an alien in Men in Black (1997)? It turns out the actor's costume and makeup were carefully designed to progressively decompose scene by scene, creating a realistic depiction of the character’s physical deterioration.

Image: Siebbi, via Wikimedia Commons

In American Psycho, Willem Dafoe filmed the scene in which Detective Kimball interviews the dangerous Patrick Bateman several times. Why? The director asked him to play it three different ways: one in which Kimball knows Bateman is the killer, another in which he is suspicious but unsure, and a third in which he is completely unaware. The three versions were then edited together, creating the legendary scene that leaves viewers paranoid and disoriented.

Image: Jesse Gardner

For Interstellar (2014), Christopher Nolan needed a large cornfield for the scenes on Cooper’s farm. But he didn’t use an existing field or create one digitally; he had a massive 500-acre cornfield planted from scratch! The bonus? The studio later harvested and sold the corn, earning around $162,000.

Image: NASA

Since Interstellar premiered in October 2014, only about 1.5 hours have passed on Miller’s Planet.

Okay, this might not be strictly a behind-the-scenes fact, but it’s a fun way the fictional world connects to our own. According to the film, one hour on Miller’s Planet equals seven years on Earth. That means the 11 years that have passed since the premiere amount to just 94 minutes on the distant planet.

Image: Road Trip with Raj

In the 2002 Spider-Man movie, there’s a famous scene where Tobey Maguire’s Peter Parker catches Mary Jane’s falling tray of food with the precision and speed of a true superhero. Although it looks like a special effect, no VFX were involved—the actor really did it! The catch, however, required 156 takes to get right.