The initial reaction to this film was positive, a writer for the New Yorker at the time went so far as to call it "a fairly substantial addition to the celluloid landscape" (bold!). I wonder, however, if they'd inserted that word into the title (12 Angry WHITE Men) whether it would have gone over so well. Me guessy not so muchy.
Of course, it's unfair to make such assertions. It's placating, it's "virtual signaling." The murder suspect in the plot is supposed to be Puerto Rican, although that's never referenced directly. He's poor, different, you know, not like these 12 dudes deciding on his fate. So – long story short – Henry Fonda changes the other guys' minds and they all change their vote from guilty to not guilty. All in a tight 90 minutes! Bada-bing Bada-boom. A fairly substantial addition to the celluloid landscape, indeed.
It's easy to see this as a progressive work within the imagined structure of the 1950s. But there's the rub.... it's all just... imagined. 1957 doesn't exist. The elderly of today were, at best, children or teens in 1957. This is the nature of time, folks. Sorry to be the one to tell you how time works and how the opinions and experiences of those on death's doorsteps (via the electric chair, or something else) are worth less than the collective wills and desires of the mean. We can't stand on the ideas of something that no longer exists, let alone have the creators of those ideas have some kind of meaningful say. We can't make something great.... again. Because who's to say what was what, and when, or how it was, if so. That's the very nature (flaw) of history. It's fluid. I don't need to give anyone the benefit of the doubt, let alone some ghost from a bygone era. This is not some progressive statement. They don't vote not guilty to dismantle some biased system. No, they tactfully deconstruct the facts of a case, Columbo-style, until they can't help but mumble, both with glee and self-pitying defeat.... "reasonable doubt." There's no social justice in the physics of sound or the ornamental design of a switchblade. That's just stuff. And this is just 90 minutes. 90 minutes you can try to turn off the old brain to, or at least lower the volume. There's nothing reasonable about it.
You google the name of the actor who played the defendant ("john savoca") and this is the top non-IMDb result:
That ain't it, folks. But, yeah... RIP.
CHRONOLOGICALLY
⫷ EPISODE 268 - (YOU ARE HERE) - EPISODE 270 ⫸
⫷ EPISODE 268 - (YOU ARE HERE) - EPISODE 270 ⫸
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