One of the most realistic classic movies of all time

Rating: 9/10 (15 February 2017)

The movie is based on a play, and almost the entire movie happens in a jury room. Such a small location, at first look, is more like a location for a play performance, not a movie. This fact leads us to think of a movie with more exaggerated acts. However, when you watch "12 Angry Men," you realize that everything in the movie is so real, not only the setting but also the story, dialogues and characters. Compared to other movies at that era (or even today), "12 Angry Men" is not a long one (it is just about 90 minutes), yet, as Roger Ebert once said, it "sometimes feels as if the movie is shot in real time." From the moment that the jury members enter the jury room, we start to know them one by one and step by step through their short talks and conversations about simple ordinary things such as the weather or their jobs. And this is what in a real life happens. It is very interesting to me that, despite this fact that the movie was made about 60 years ago, the characters and their conversations seem very real and alive. I believe that everything in this movie is ahead of the time it was created. We all know that actors are performing their acts and delivering their dialogues directly and word by word based on the screenplay. Nevertheless, we never realize this fact when we are watching the movie. You think that everything is happening right before your eyes, exactly like what happens in a documentary movie. In a classic setting, usually there is only one character who speaks or acts, and others usually wait for him to finish his or her statement and then start to talk or act. This is not that common in real life because people react to others' statements or acts in a real-time, and do not wait for them to finish their words to show a reaction. In "12 Angry Men," we see this kind of real scenes a lot. We see two or three characters speaking in front of the camera, and at the same time we hear other people's reactions or see some other actions in the background. everything is real, fast, and believable, exactly like what happens in our daily life.