The Verdict

I saw this movie when it was released in the theaters ( yes, I am that old! ), and it remains among the best courtroom dramas and character studies ever made.
Jack Warden, James Mason and Charlotte Rampling are all flawlessly great, but Paul Newman was BRILLIANT playing the ambulance-chasing turned righteously indignant Frank Galvin ( the scene where he is photographing his client in the hospital! his meeting with the archdiocese! his return to his apartment after the judge refuses his request for a delay! Newman's best and most emotionally exposed acting ever ). I still refuse to see "Ghandi" because of the resentment I feel over the choice of Ben Kingsley for Oscar's best actor when THIS WAS THE ROLE FOR WHICH NEWMAN SHOULD HAVE WON!!
Nobody I have ever known , seeing this movie for the first time, fails to be riveted to the screen during the final ten minutes.

Mixing the talents of three all time greats in a movie should produce solid results; failures do occur, but here we see the peak of success. Sidney Lumet directs Paul Newman and James Mason in a powerhouse film which, though generally downbeat, never loses your attention and indeed grips in its storyline and through these performances. Newman plays a laywer who's seen the good times, (way back), but is now in a shambling and hopeless state. His friend, played by the ever reliable Jack Warden, though near the end of his tether at Newman's pathetic drunken state, gives him a possible lifeline in a malpractice case. To Warden's relief he takes it, but more important takes it seriously, and despite an ever spiralling course of events which seem certain to bring about his final, total demise, Newman finally triumphs. The finale is absorbing and superb! Alas, and not terribly surprisingly based on the farce which is so often the Oscar Ceremony, the film, Newman, and Mason all failed to win the oscars they so richly deserved. A crime that Newman should lose for this, then be given one of those pathetic Honorary Awards (remember when they gave one to the previously un-Oscared Kirk Douglas for his performance having a stroke? No doubt they thought it would be their last chance before he died, pleasingly Mr. Douglas has proved them wrong), and then a genuine one for Newman the next year in "The Color Of Money" because the first was seen through for what it was: a too late apology. As for Mr. Mason, this sadly would be his third and final failure at garnering an Oscar, (as he did pass away two years later), beaten by Louis Gosset Jr. for a non-stop-yelling performance which totally lacked the sublety which made Mason's so much MORE menacing. Enough griping, watch this film and you'll see why these two actors are probably the finest their respective countries have ever produced. Deep, harrowing at times, but nonetheless a real treat!

Although the pretext of this film, ie a washed up lawyer with a drinking problem, can be rather bleak and depressing at times during the course of this movie, it is one of my favourite Newman films, and really shows what a great actor he was. This is a triumphant film of the classic theme of the small man against the big system. I often feel that Paul Newman is one of cinemas most underrated actors, and this film shows how incredibly powerful and convincing he was as an actor.