Overall Rating
  Awesome: 72.41%
Worth A Look: 13.79%
Average: 8.62%
Pretty Bad: 1.72%
Total Crap: 3.45%
2 reviews, 46 user ratings
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| 12 Angry Men (1957) |
by Slyder
"12 people rambling makes for great filmmaking? How is that possible?"
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Just like he did before with the Ox-Bow Incident, Henry Fonda fought with studio moguls to have this film made since he liked Reginald Rose's script so much. In the end, his wish was granted and enlisted a then-rookie director called Sidney Lumet to direct the film. It failed commercially despite earning several awards and prize nominations. But as everyone knows, commercial success or failure doesn't tell the whole tale but rather the content of the movie does. And just like The Ox-Bow Incident, this film managed to age gracefully and stand out as one of the finest films of its time. Who would’ve thought that you could get so much tension from a single set and 12 people rambling for 95 minutes? Lumet would later forge a legendary status later making several kickass films diverse in several subject matters, but it all started here, and one could not ask for a better start.Simple plot: A boy is on trial for his life since he’s been accused of murdering his father. 11 jurors (Lee J. Cobb, Ed Begley, EG Marshall, Jack Warden, Martin Balsam, John Fiedler Jack Klugman, Ed Binns, Joseph Sweeney, George Voscovec, and Robert Webber) are convinced that he’s guilty; one juror (Fonda) has no doubt of his innocence. How can this one man steer the others into the same conclusion?
Sure, one can immediately scream “PREDICTABLE” at the mere reading of that outline, but there’s a difference between knowing how a film is going to end, and going through it towards the end, and if you can just give it that much, you’re in for a ride that’s worth the rent. The film is not necessarily about solving the case but more about the jurors being sure beyond a reasonable doubt that the boy is guilty of the crime that he’s been accused of. It takes us to a journey of tense and claustrophobic proportions as this one juror forces the other jurors to reexamine all the facts of the case to be sure that there are no holes in which they may send a possible innocent man to his death while at the same time averting and knocking down the several racial and personal prejudices that many of the jurors have.
The film contains several powerful scenes aided by some impressive camerawork despite the limited settings and top-notch acting. One might think that there are almost zero opportunities in making some good photography when the movie is pretty much completely shot in a single room. But Lumet is such a pro, as he intelligently uses different lenses and camera angles for each of the film’s thirds, the first being above the characters, the second leveled with them, and the third below them, each time using a longer lens closing in even more on the character’s faces and making the background walls seem closer and closer, tightening the tension to the movie to a point of near overwhelming proportions. All in all a very well crafted piece of work by Lumet backed by the aforementioned very intelligent and well-developed script by Reginald Rose.
In regards of acting performances, we have a large cast of them and ensemble acting couldn’t get any better here. Fonda, Marshall, and Begley all give superb performances, as well as then-newcomers like Jack Warden and Martin Balsam, but in my opinion no one tops the bill like the towering presence of Lee J. Cobb. The guy was one of the finest actors of his generation and also one of the most underrated, and here he gives one of his finest performances ever and his work here even earned him a Golden Globe nod; he truly deserved it, since he was a riot from start to finish. Shame the Academy passed on him though.In the end, this film is fucking awesome and is a certified classic. If you seriously think that a film consisting of 12 people confined in one room that do nothing but talk and ramble for 95 minutes makes for boring filmmaking? Think again. Watch this film. Trust me, you’ll love it. 5-5
link directly to this review at http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=5803&reviewer=235
originally posted: 04/22/04 12:38:31
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USA
02-Mar-1957
UK
N/A
Australia
02-Feb-1958 (G)
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