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Reginald Rose wrote for television, film and the theater, coming into his own in 1954 with a work that would be his masterpiece, 12 Angry Men. On television, it starred Franchot Tone as the angry and bitter juror #3 and Robert Cummings as the thoughtful, patient and argumentative juror #8, two men battling each other for the life of a young man standing trial for murder. If that duo doesn’t set you on fire, it may have more to do with who followed them than the actors themselves. Tone and Cummings were terrific, of course, but once you see the 1957 Sidney Lumet directed film adaptation, you’ll never think of anyone else but Lee J. Cobb and Henry Fonda in those roles again. And I say that having seen the 1997 television remake with the formidable George C. Scott and Jack Lemmon taking on the roles. They were great, too, but Cobb and Fonda take the prize, as does the film itself.
Most of us know the story by now. A young man stands trial for the stabbing death of his father. As the evidence seemed stacked against him, the jurors believe they will be home before dinner. Unfortunately for them, one juror, #8, dissents. That gets the ball rolling towards its inevitable but unlikely destination, acquittal. And no, there’s probably not a viewer dead or alive who ever watched the film and wondered what the verdict would be (so no spoiler alert necessary). That’s because the verdict isn’t the point so much as the journey that gets us there.
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It’s been argued before that the final acquittal is probably wrong. After all, every bit of reasoning the jurors use is purely circumstantial. Yes, the knife is common but the defendant did own one. He screamed loud enough for the neighbors to hear that he was going to kill his father and the woman across the street saw him. They decide to throw her sworn testimony out because they could tell from the indentations on the ridge of her nose that she wore glasses. That’s right, testimony entered into the record, dismissed because, hey, come on, she wears glasses! The overwhelming odds against someone using the same knife to kill a man whose son just screamed he was going to kill that very man before going to the movies are too high to calculate. Nonetheless, I think deconstructing the movie this way misses the point.
Like I said, everyone walking into the movie knows they will eventually get to an acquittal but it’s not about shocking us with a twist ending, it’s about the thought process itself, and the power of persuasion. Surely we can all think of a few infamous jury decisions that we will never understand because we weren’t in that deliberating room. And just as surely, the people watching the trial in the fictitious universe of 12 Angry Men must have thought them crazy after the foreman read the verdict aloud. So when we watch the movie and criticize it for the ridiculous arguments going on in the jury room, we’re focusing on the wrong thing.
Reginald Rose was inspired to write the play after serving on a jury in which, as he said, they argued like crazy for eight straight hours. He never said he was inspired to write it because he felt a welling of emotion when he freed an innocent man. No, he was impressed by the fighting and wanted that to be the movie. That it became known as an advertisement for the greatness of the jury system, and the concept of innocent until proven guilty, was thrust upon it by outside observers. It’s quite possible to take the movie as an intentional portrayal of a hopelessly incompetent jury decision after one man, juror #8, quietly but steadily bullies everyone into stretching their imaginations as far as they possibly can to squeeze reasonable doubt out of the evidence. And in that light, it becomes a better tool for understanding just how important it is for both sides to present their evidence and testimony as clearly and unambiguously as possible, because once that jury room door closes, who in the hell knows what might happen.
12 Angry Men is one of those plays that gets performed enough that the title itself becomes a problem. The 1957 film version has 12 white men. No women, no persons of color whatsoever. As a result, it’s often called 12 Angry Jurors when performed today. And it’s had some great adaptations with varied casts but the 1957 film version still reigns supreme over all of them for two reasons: Henry Fonda and Lee J. Cobb. But mainly, Lee J. Cobb. Even George C. Scott didn’t have the same furious energy, the same snide condescension that this kid’s life should be given a second look, that Cobb had. Cobb, who never won an Oscar, nonetheless gave multiple Oscar worthy performances. This was one of them.
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Sidney Lumet, also coming out of television, got his first big movie break with this one and would go on to a career that contains some of the best loved movies of all time, or at least the 1970s. But 12 Angry Men doesn’t get mentioned a lot for Lumet because it’s a writer’s play and an actor’s play. It’s about the dialogue, the emotion and the fights. It’s not about who’s right or wrong, it’s about who does a better job of persuading everyone else. In other words, it showcases both the strengths and weaknesses of the jury system, and possibly, the dangers. When those 12 men walk away at the end, they feel good about themselves but was justice served? Who knows? All we know is, we just watched a battle, and juror #8 was the victor.
12 Angry Men is running for a limited time on the Criterion Channel of FilmStruck. It will be available through July 31, 2017.
Greg Ferrara