12 ANGRY MEN

(April 1957, U.S.)

Despite my usually detailed memory, I honestly can't remember if I ever read the original play of 12 ANGRY MEN as required reading for middle school or high school English class. I usually never enjoyed any of the required reading in school, but based on the late Sidney Lumet's classic black and white debut feature film, I can't imagine that I would've balked at the idea of reading such a powerful courtroom drama.

On what seems to be the hottest day of the summer in 1950's New York City, Henry Fonda leads a group of twelve jury men deliberating the conviction or acquittal of a young boy accused of stabbing his father to death, and facing the electric chair if convicted. They've been instructed by the judge that if there's any reasonable doubt whatsoever, they're required to return a verdict of not guilty. In the end, their verdict (either way) must be unanimous. In the beginning, Fonda stands alone amidst a sea of convincing evidence to the boy's guilt. This evidence includes the testimony of a neighbor who claims to have witnessed from her window, the boy stab his father, and another neighbor claiming to have heard the defendant threaten to kill his father and then hearing the body hit the floor, and then witnessing the defendant run past his door. The boy's violent past serves to further convince the jury of his immediate guilt. Fonda as Juror #8 is the only one of twelve men who doesn't want to jump to any hasty conclusion and only asks to talk the matters out first before concluding a final verdict.

In a rather step-by-step process, Fonda questions the reliability of the witnesses and also casts doubt on the supposed unique nature of switch blade used as the murder weapon, as he happens to own the same sort of knife. He's just introduced reasonable doubt, and the decision of the remaining eleven jurors must now be examined. This is the point in the film where perhaps it's not impossible to compare the story to Agatha Christie's AND THEN THERE WERE NONE. No murder involved, of course, but one by one, each juror who was so previously set in their own ways of thinking is "picked off" as they now find reason to question their values and morals, thus reversing their conviction of a guilty verdict to that of not guilty.

By the time the day has progressed, and the weather outside has become as loud and stormy as the angry debates and string of arguments inside the deliberation room, each juror, including the most die hard angry Juror #3 (played by Lee J. Cobb) believing that the undesirable accused defendant must die to pay for his anger against his own ungrateful son, has succumb to the questionable evidence and all reasonable doubt until the entire team of jurors stands at the opposite side of the spectrum as compared to how they started out. The boy is found not guilty and the jurors leave the courthouse, perhaps wiser men with a better understanding of their own humanity.

There is traditional drama, and then there's the sort of absorbing drama that manages to create the sort of claustrophobic atmosphere that 12 ANGRY MEN does with its multi use of camera positions and close-ups. One can't help but feel spellbound as we watch these men locked in a small room with no air conditioning slowly begin to unravel at the thought of deliberating any longer than they have to against circumstantial evidence and their own personal prejudices against a minority slum kid they believe to be guilty from the start. Change is key here, as the hearts of twelve men becomes increasingly less angry until what appears to be justice is finally served. Sadly, we're given no hint whatsoever as to just who may have actually killed the boy's father and why. In the end, we may only be left with the prejudices of the time, in which many believed people of the slum to be so bad, that they'd just go around killing each other for no reason. I wonder if we're any wiser today?

Favorite line or dialogue:

Juror #8 (to Juror #3): "Ever since you walked into this room, you've been acting like a self-appointed public avenger! You want to see this boy die because you personally want it, not because of the facts! You're a sadist!"