So good it belongs in a time capsule

Rating: 10/10 (28 September 2012)

A man has been brutally murdered and now the life of his eighteen-year-old son, the prime suspect for his killing, is in the hands of twelve jurors. At first glance, it's an open-and-shut case: two witnesses supposedly saw and heard him do it; he had a clear motive; and he even owned an identical knife to the murder weapon. Yet, while eleven jurors are completely convinced of his guilt - some because of the sheer weight of evidence and others due to their own personal prejudices - one man (Henry Fonda) is not. He does not necessarily believe the defendant to be innocent; he simply isn't sure of his guilt. Alone, ridiculed and under intense pressure to conform, he must persuade his fellow jurors one by one that all is not as it seems.
The scene is set for a fascinating cinematic study of the human condition and, arguably, the most gripping film ever made.
I meant to review 12 Angry Men for my university paper two years ago, but never got around to it. Now, having recently completed my first stint of jury service, I believe the time couldn't be more apt for me to right this small injustice. For Sidney Lumet's directorial debut, with its perfect acting, intriguing plot and technical mastery, symbolises for me all that is good about Hollywood cinema, but which we rarely get to see.
Based on Reginald Rose's teleplay of the same name, 12 Angry Men takes place almost entirely within a drab and claustrophobic deliberation room. There are no set changes and little in the way of action; only gorgeous, clinical dialogue. In a genuine feat for 1957, however, Lumet's camera glides effortlessly around this room, making it appear far bigger than it truly is; indeed making it seem as if you yourself are walking around it, like the jurors tasked with deciding a man's fate.
For the classicists reading this, the film adheres to the unities of time, space and action, with film-time closely mirroring audience-time, a detail that yet again transports us against our will inside that room. Lumet also presents a Moby-Dick-esque 'self-enclosed universe', in that each juryman represents a specific human trait: anger, meekness, indifference, compassion - the best of humanity and the worst. It is a film replete with close-ups of human faces, as if the director is constantly trying to see what lies behind them.
What at first appears to be a simple story of revenge is gradually and ingeniously deconstructed by Fonda's character until the audience doesn't quite know what to believe by the end. Every time we think we've reached the bottom of the mystery before us, new depths reveal themselves, until all we're left with is multiple pictures of the truth taken from confusing angles, rather than a single definitive image.
Fonda is imperious as the white-suited knight of justice, fighting bigotry (the defendant's ethnicity is left ambiguous) and ignorance at every turn on his quest to discover the truth. What might entertain you even more than his rhetoric, however, is the detailed characterisation on show throughout - twelve men who are utterly believable and who all have their own unique motivations for voting "guilty" or "not guilty".
Aside from Fonda, notable performances come from Lee J. Cobb (The Exorcist), who plays the antagonistic Juror #3, and Joseph Sweeney, an actor whose IMDb profile page doesn't even include a photograph, but who is sublime as the elderly yet highly observant Juror #8. Perhaps the biggest compliment I can pay to this film is to say that there isn't a single average performance in it. Good as the actors are, however, they are helped massively by Rose's acidic script, memorable monologues, and one-liners that are so incisive they'll leave you stunned to silence.
On that note, I can't think of a film that has as many genuinely surprising moments as 12 Angry Men.
12 Angry Men is not devoid of humour - indeed it contains several amusing characters who provide much comic relief - but it is first and foremost an intellectual, psychological and, dare I say it, philosophical film that has been teaching us about ourselves for over 50 years now. It really belongs in a time capsule; it certainly deserves a place in your movie collection.