12 Angry Men

It’s hard to imagine a stagier movie (and I mean that in the very best sense) than this one-set, twelve-character offering from Sidney Lumet. And indeed the script was adapted by Reginald Rose from his teleplay for Studio One on CBS in 1954. Live television! Very primitive equipment. All twelve performances are terrific, anchored by the only marquee star, Henry Fonda. The rest include Martin Balsam, Lee J. Cobb, E.G. Marshall, Jack Warden, Ed Begley, and Jack Klugman. The initial vote is 11 to 1 to convict the defendant, who we see only briefly. Naturally, it is quiet, reasonable Fonda. In the course of two hours he manages to win over all eleven to the position of reasonable doubt. That’s what I love about this movie, the fact that there is no last-minute revelation, no assurance that the kid on trial didn’t kill his father, only that the prosecution had not proved it. The story has been remade in German, Spanish, Hindi, and Chinese. There is a Russian version, 12, with the added element of suspense when the jurors figure out who really was the killer, and have to make a surprising decision. It being Russia, I can see how that was necessary, but I felt it weakened the story, as well as frequent flashbacks to the awful childhood of the accused.