| Overall Grade: |
A+ |
|
| Story: |
A+ |
|
|
| Acting: |
A+ |
|
|
| Direction: |
A+ |
|
|
| Visuals: |
A+ |
|
|
The Great Movies: Anatomy Of A Murder
by Eric (movies profile)
Sep 7, 2007
7
of
7 people found this review helpful
I don't know if this movie is properly named. There are so many elements that this film covers, the actual murder seems more a cataylist than the main topic. Otto Preminger's 1959 masterpiece had to have been one of the most hated movies of that time, busting taboos left and right with such glee and vicious determination. But what I think is most intersting about this film is that nearly 47 years have passed, and yet these taboos are still around, we are just a little better at identifying them.
The film starts off after the fact,when small-town attorney Paul Biegler (James Stewart) returns to town from a fishing trip to find a message about a new client arranged by his old friend (and resident drunk) Parnell (played with introspection by Arthur O'Connell). It's a murder case involving an soldier (Ben Garazza) who killed a local barkeep who supposedly raped his wife (Lee Remick).
Biegler isn't attracted by the case so much out of noble causes but because he's past due paying his secretary and possibly other bills. His once-over with the soldier isn't very promising, he's brash, obnoxious, and he was seen doing it. The only chance he can get him off is temporary insanity. Note that I didn't say if the soldier was in fact insane at the time, because he might not have been.
There's just one other problem, Biegler's never defended a criminal case before. He was once a prosecuter for the county before losing that job to a man who had more political skill and less legal ones. The added bonus to this case for him is to run circles around the other guy. But the D.A. brings in a more superior man from the Attorney General's office (George C. Scott), to make him look good. From behind the scenes, this man is the master player, knowing where to strike the defendant and make his character and his justification obsolete.
One of the brave things this film does, besides openly talking about rape and sexuality is show courtrooms not so much as a battle between right and wrong, but a sport between two sides that doesn't care anything about ideas. The fact that the wife is never shown with any sympathy until it's time for her to testify. And in fact, the state even goes so far out to make it a point that it might not have happened. That perhaps she did have sex with the deceased, but it was consentual. The highlight of this debate comes at the end when a last-minute witness comes with a piece of evidence that would solve this question, someone we know about earlier in the film. The prosecution's determination to disprove that evidence is so heated, they don't see what we already know is going to happen, they're going to tear their own case apart on the wrong assumption.
That scene belongs to Scott, as this is his only glorious scene in the film. The rest of his part is making guestures and suggestions that are so subtle that we know he's a much bigger fish than anyone else in that room and swallow everybody up in a single bite. For Remick, this film is a testament to her abilities, considering that she's playing a pampered army wife that can easily be seen being both the victim or the instigator. There are scenes that suggest she's adulturous, but not enough to prove it, so we're left with ambiguity, not wanting to confirm or deny that we believe her side of things. James Stewart has played morally challenged characters before, but I like to this his Biegler is a response to Atticus Finch (the book, the film was made 3 years later), or to all those homogenized courtroom dramas that think on the level of whodunit. His character is more real, more when-will-you-pay-me. And one of the most overlooked performances can be issued to Joseph N. Welch as the judge, who is perplexed by the grandstanding attorneys and twisting developments in the case, and has some of the best one liners in the film.
Otto Preminger has dedicated his career in taking chances in movies. He was a little ahead of his time in that reguard since the real movement started in the mid-sixties and got fired up in the early seventies. He tackled so many different elements in both his famous works and not-so-famous. Take Carmen Jones (1954), the first all-black film starring Dorothy Dandridge during the height of segregation. One thing can be said about his movies is that while not all of them worked, they were never boring.
I look at movies and television shows that deal with rape and courtroom dramas today. It surprises me that we still ask victims if they inadvertantly asked for it to happen by wearing a slinky dress. It amazes me that we still look at sex as the greatest hush-hush thing in the world, that it's okay if you like it, just don't let it be seen that you REALLY like it. In that manner, we're still caught in the 50s. And this film proves it. |
My Public Profile 
