12 Angry Men, 4 stars

Well, don't I feel sheepish. Here I was, paying most of my attention to this movie and finding a well-acted but psychologically trite drama that, for its time period, I found to be well above average. Then I went to read the secondary literature on it and found that the director, Sidney Lumet, had subtly changed the focal length of his lenses to pull us more into the action and flatten out the frame as the film progressed to create a sense of claustrophobia. I had one of those forehead-slapping moments where I thought I should just be sent back to film analysis 101 until I learn to notice these things myself.

After forgiving myself, however, I did not alter my rating of the film. Its flaws are unimproved by this new knowledge about the lenses. While it is a taut drama that was probably quite daring formally for its time, the fact remains that the psychology of the film is suspect. It is unlikely that men with such strong personalities would change their minds in the course of an afternoon, and that they would reveal their psychological failings so quickly to a roomful of other men that they barely know. The film's strengths are many, however: the aforementioned "lens plot", the performances (Henry Fonda is rightly praised but the entire cast is deserving), and the formal daring required to set a film essentially in one room, in near-real time, and trust the script and performers to draw the audience into such a closed setting.

This is a classic film for those interested in the law, and I read with interest that a remake has been made in Russia which addresses the Chechen conflict there. I also note that this remake is nearly twice as long as the original. It will be interesting to see what "12" (the remake) does with such a tight, flawless conceit as the one found in the classic "12 Angry Men".