The title of the movie is ‘TWELVE ANGRY MEN’, which is mostly true, except that one or two are extraordinarily patient and wise (Jack Lemon etc) and the rest are extraordinarily impatient and biased ( George C Scott, Tony Danza etc) as they play part of a jury that decides the fate of a young man who is accused of murdering his own father with a knife that he purchased only a day earlier. There are three colored (black) people in the jury. Only Jack Lemon’s character chooses not guilty verdict initially while the others are in a hurry to pronounce him guilty. There are at least three old men in the jury.
As they argue and scream at each other in the hot and sweaty jury room, their biases slowly unfold. For example, one black man with a religious bent, openly expresses his view that ‘spics’ are taking over the country and this was an opportunity to nail one of them ! Danza's character also changes his vote to not guilty when he overhears a conversation between two jury members during a break and realizes that their votes are based on racism as well. Scott’s character cries in pain ‘you raise your kids with love and care and they leave you to die alone’ . He is biased against the young accused because of his bad experience with his own son!
The patient old man Jack then casts doubt on the evidence presented in the court including the claim of a lady who says she witnessed the murder from a building across the street through the windows of a passing train !
Therefore, the jury in the end passes ‘not guilty ‘ verdict because they cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the young man murdered his father.
The drama unfolds inside a jury room; it could as well have been in a work place, an apartment complex, a public library, a grocery store or a busy street in the USA. Thankfully, the movie stays civilized and the accused is not miamed or shot dead before reaching the court room…
No comments:
Post a Comment