12 Angry Men: It's Indescribably Great

On the Internet Movie Database, stylized as IMDb, there's a feature devoted to the 250 movies on the site that have received the highest scores from audiences. As a critic, I firmly believe that some of the movies on this list deserve to hold such a position, and as for the others? Well, let's just say that some fanbases of varying popular IPs are loyal to a fault. Anyway, why do I bring this up? Well, holding position #5 for the highest-rated movie on the site is a really old legal drama called 12 Angry Men. The thing had just been sitting in my watchlist for about two years up until this point, and now that I've watched both Ikiru and now 12 Angry Men, I can say that I've seen not just one, but two all-time-great classics in the span of two days. But for as much of a masterpiece as Ikiru was, and for as deserving a recommendation as it was, there have been a handful of other movies like it. I can't say that there's ever been another movie quite like 12 Angry Men, and if there has, I've yet to find it. If you watch movies in any capacity - as a fan, as a critic, or otherwise - I believe this movie to be an absolute must-watch, no matter which approach, genre, or period of cinema may be your preference. I wrote at the top of this review that 12 Angry Men is "indescribably great." I stand by that sentiment, and yet, I'm going to try to describe it, nonetheless. But until you watch this movie, you may not understand why I'm trying in the first place. I'm not going to spoil it, as is standard protocol for my articles, but this is your last warning before you can go into this movie completely blind, which you may not know you want to. Just trust me on this one.

12 Angry Men, a 1957 legal drama directed by Sidney Lumet and adapted from a 1954 television movie, follows 12 unnamed jurors who have been placed over a murder case involving an inner-city boy who is pretty much undoubtedly guilty and dead to rights. However, when one of the jurors dissents, though a death sentence requires a unanimous vote, he sets into motion a twisting and turning series of events that will decide the boy's fate in the most unprecedented and unpredictable of ways.

They say the devil's in the details, and one detail I really like about 12 Angry Men is that it never assigns the jurors names - only numbers. It helps not having to remember names, and having the jurors sit around the table in the order of their assigned number is a smart move on the part of Lumet and his team. Sometimes, less is more, and this rule applies to both the characters and the plot of the movie. The rules of the jury are clearly defined - everyone needs to vote "guilty" to hand down a death sentence - and I never found myself lost in subplots, and that's because this movie's focus is sublime. What's more, it's approach to its plotting is interesting. 12 Angry Men starts off by making you sure that the defendant is guilty of everything he's being accused of, and as time goes on, the movie takes an interesting and unusual route to deconstruct what we thought we knew and make us doubt. It uses some effective tricks that gradually make us less and less sure of what we took for granted, most notably framing some of the jurors as callous and impatient to go about their day. Casting even more doubt on the whole situation are some plot twists that are nothing short of what I described in my initial notes as mic-drop moments. If you think that old movies are boring, you obviously haven't seen 12 Angry Men.

The way in which the film develops and subverts its story throughout places it among what I would believe to be the greatest movies ever made, and the slowly developing story stays exciting and entertaining all the way up until the end, which is a remarkable feat given that everything that happens in this movie is only relayed to us through the second-hand conversations of the jurors. Yes, it may sound low-brow, but the fun factor of 12 Angry Men is unexpected and enthralling, which isn't something I expected to be saying about anything related to a court case anytime soon. What's more, the memory of this movie is impeccable. It's constantly referencing stuff that happened previously in the plot, and this gives everything that happens an undeniable sense of weight because you know that it could and probably will make all the difference later on.

Sometimes, a perfect review will suffice and do justice to how great this movie or that movie may be. Other times, I don't think even a perfect score is high enough. So, I'm going to try to make up for that with my closing paragraph. 12 Angry Men is a movie that has stood the test of time for a reason, the reason being that it is already perfect in just about every way, but chooses to take its revelations and plot even further and surprise us when it doesn't really need to. I said it in my article about Ikiru, and I'm going to say it again: we all know a fact and are just too afraid to say it. The fact is that we often rate movies too highly because they are shot in black and white. We don't realize it, but we run the risk of becoming numb to black-and-white movies that are true masterpieces if we call every black-and-white movie a masterpiece or even good. I think a good dose of nostalgic honesty is due in our culture so that we can give movies like 12 Angry Men the level of undiluted respect they're worthy of. Because sometimes, a classic movie really isn't as good as we remember. And other times, it's too great to be treated with a glib reverence that waters words like "masterpiece" down.

12 Angry Men is that type of movie.

12 Angry Men - 10/10

James 2:12-13