"12 Angry Men" focuses on a jury's deliberations in a capital murder case.

A
12-man jury is sent to begin deliberations in the first-degree murder trial of
an 18-year-old Latino accused in the stabbing death of his father, where a
guilty verdict means an automatic death sentence. The case appears to be
open-and-shut: The defendant has a weak alibi; a knife he claimed to have
lost is found at the murder scene; and several witnesses either heard
screaming, saw the killing or the boy fleeing the scene. Eleven of the jurors
immediately vote guilty; only Juror No. 8 (Mr. Davis) casts a not guilty vote.
At first Mr. Davis' bases his vote more so for the sake of discussion after all,
the jurors must believe beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is
guilty. As the deliberations unfold, the story quickly becomes a study of the
jurors' complex personalities (which range from wise, bright and empathetic
to arrogant, prejudiced and merciless), preconceptions, backgrounds and
interactions. That provides the backdrop to Mr. Davis' attempts in convincing
the other jurors that a "not guilty" verdict might be appropriate.
A dissenting juror in a murder trial slowly manages to convince the others
that the case is not as obviously clear as it seemed in court.

Andrew Beckett (Tom Hanks) is a senior associate at the largest corporate law firm in
Philadelphia. Although he lives with his partner Miguel lvarez (Antonio Banderas),
Beckett is not open about his homosexuality at the law firm, nor the fact that he has
AIDS. On the day he is assigned the firm's newest and most important case, one of the
firm's partners notices a small lesion on Beckett's forehead. Shortly thereafter, Beckett
stays home from work for several days to try to find a way to hide his lesions. While at
home, he finishes the complaint for the case he has been assigned and then brings it to
his office, leaving instructions for his assistants to file the complaint in court on the
following day, which marks the end of the statute of limitations for the case. Beckett
suffers from bowel spasms at home and is rushed to the hospital. Later that morning,
while still at the ER, he receives a frantic call from the firm asking for the complaint, as
the paper copy cannot be found and there are no copies on the computer's hard drive.
However, the complaint is finally discovered and is filed with the court at the last
possible moment. The following day, Beckett is dismissed by the firm's partners, who
had previously referred to him as their "buddy", but now question his professional
abilities in light of the misplaced document. Beckett believes that someone deliberately
hid his paperwork to give the firm a pretext to fire him, and that the firing is actually as a
result of his diagnosis with AIDS. He asks several attorneys to take his case, including
personal injury lawyer Joe Miller (Denzel Washington), with whom he had been involved
in a previous case. Miller, who is admittedly homophobic and knows little about
Beckett's AIDS, initially declines to take the case and immediately visits his doctor to
find out if he could have contracted the AIDS through shaking Beckett's hand. The

doctor explains the methods of HIV infection. The doctor then offers to take a sample of
Miller's blood, suspecting that Miller was asking about AIDS because he suspected he
had contracted it and was trying to hide it. Miller dismisses the request by laughing it off,
thinking it a joke. Unable to find a lawyer willing to represent him, Beckett is compelled
to act as his own attorney. While researching a case at a law library, Miller sees Beckett
at a nearby table. After a librarian announces that he has found a book on AIDS
discrimination for Beckett, others in the library begin to first stare and then move away,
and the librarian suggests Beckett retire to a private room. Disgusted by their behavior,
Miller approaches Beckett and reviews the material he has gathered. It is obvious he
has decided to take the case. Upon receiving a summons by Miller, the head of the firm,
Charles Wheeler (Jason Robards), worries about the damage the lawsuit could do to his
business and reputation, although one partner (Ron Vawter) unsuccessfully tries to
convince them to settle out of court with Beckett. As the case goes before the court,
Wheeler takes the stand, claiming that Beckett was incompetent and claiming that he
had deliberately tried to hide his condition. The defense repeatedly suggests that
Beckett had invited his illness through promiscuity and was therefore not a victim. In the
course of testimony, it is revealed that the partner who had noticed Beckett's lesion had
previously worked with a woman who had contracted AIDS after a blood transfusion and
so would have recognized the lesion as relating to AIDS. To prove that the lesions
would have been visible, Miller asks Beckett to unbutton his shirt while on the witness
stand, revealing that his lesions were indeed visible and recognizable as such. During
cross-examination, Beckett admits that he was originally planning to tell his law
colleagues that he was gay, but changed his mind after hearing them make homophobic
jokes in the sauna of a health club. When asked about the truth of how he got infected,
he confirms that he engaged in anonymous sex with another man at a pornographic
movie theater. However, he and Miller gain an advantage when the partner who advised
settling out of court confesses he long suspected Beckett had AIDS but never said
anything, and how he regrets his inaction. Beckett collapses during Wheeler's
testimony. During his hospitalization, the jury votes in his favor, awarding him back pay,
damages for pain and suffering, and punitive damages totaling nearly $4.5M. Miller
visits Beckett in the hospital after the verdict and overcomes his fear enough to touch
Beckett's face. After Beckett's family leaves the room, he tells Miguel that he is ready to
die. A short scene immediately afterward shows Miller getting the word that Beckett has
died. The movie ends with a reception at Beckett's home following the funeral, where
many mourners, including the Millers, view home movies of Beckett as a healthy child.

When sweet Northern college kid Bill (Ralph Macchio) and his buddy Stan (Mitchell
Whitfield) are picked up and thrown into the slammer in a hick Southern town, at first it
looks like no big deal. Then they are informed that they are accused of murder.
Penniless and without a single friend in the area, Bill decides to call his goofy cousin
Vinny (Joe Pesci), who has somehow recently become a lawyer. Full of family feeling
and bravado, Vinny, who has never tried a criminal case in his short life as a lawyer,
rides south to defend his trusting relative. He's an expert motormouth and street-level

logician from the wilder reaches of metropolitan New York, complete with a thick accent
and the attitude to go with it. Otherwise, he's much less well qualified than your average
public defender. When he arrives on the scene with his equally brassy girlfriend Lisa
(Marisa Tomei), Bill is fairly sure he's going to be sentenced to death. His buddy Stan is
even less confident of his legal representative, if that's possible, and the first thing Vinny
has to do is to regain the consent of his clients to represent them. The local judge
doesn't seem any too sympathetic to Vinny's verbal shenanigans either, and even the
most optimistic supporter of the boys would begin to have doubts at this point -- and
Vinny's no exception. With the insistent moral encouragement of his girlfriend, Vinny
somehow accomplishes the impossible and wins grudging (if very irritated) respect from
all concerned, for once studying as if his life depended on it.
The film stars Joe Pesci as a New Yorker who thinks a black knit shirt under a black
leather jacket, if set off by a gold chain around the neck, is elegant courtroom attire. He
might be right if he were a defendant in the Bronx, but the movie takes place in
Alabama, and he's the defense attorney. His cousin (Ralph Macchio) and a friend
(Mitchell Whitfield), two innocent college students on their way to school, have been
charged with the murder of a convenience store owner. The circumstantial evidence
looks damning, but the worst thing they have going against them is Pesci's sweeping
lack of legal experience.
Although the film is set in the South and has an early shot of a sign that says Free
Horse Manure, this is not another one of your Dixie-bashing movies. The judge (Fred
Gwynne, his face longer than ever) and prosecutor (Lane Smith) are civilized men who
aren't trying to railroad anybody. It's just that after gunshots were heard, three different
witnesses made a positive identification on the two suspects, fleeing the store in a
distinctive late-1960s Buick convertible.
Pesci, who is the Macchio character's cousin Vinny, has finally passed the bar on his
sixth attempt. He has no courtroom experience, and indeed no experience at all except
with a few personal injury cases. He arrives in town with his girlfriend, named Mona
Lisa Vito and played by Marisa Tomei as a woman who has a certain legal potential
trapped inside a street-smart personality.
Pesci is so inexperienced he doesn't even know enough to stand when the judge enters
the courtroom, and Whitfield, in desperation, hires another lawyer (Austin Pendleton)
who thinks it a triumph if he can successfully complete a sentence.
The movie saves most of its best laughs for the long concluding courtroom sequence, in
which one witness after another hammers together the prosecution case, and the
innocent youths clearly seem headed for the electric chair. Gwynne's dour work in the
courtroom scenes is especially good; in the annals of Judge Reaction Shots, which are a
performance genre all their own, his work ranks high.

In an extremely rare decision, the Catholic Church officially recognized the demonic
possession of the 19 year-old college freshman. Told in flashbacks, The Exorcism of

Emily Rose chronicles the haunting trial of the priest accused of negligence resulting in
the death of the young girl who is believed to be possessed and the lawyer who takes
on
the
task
of
defending
him.
Lawyer Erin Bruner (Laura Linney) takes on the church and the state when she fights in
defense of a priest, Father Richard Moore (Tom Wilkinson) who performed an exorcism
on a young woman, Emily Rose (Jennifer Carpenter). Bruner must battle the state
lawyer as well as her own loneliness, as she realizes that her career so far has not
fulfilled her. She takes the case, albeit reluctantly, because she believes it will elevate
her to senior partner at her law firm. The priest agrees to let her defend him only if he is
allowed
to
tell
Emily's
story.
The trial begins with the calling of several medical experts by the prosecutor, Ethan
Thomas (Campbell Scott). One expert testifies that Emily was suffering from both
epilepsy and psychosis. The defense contests that she may have actually been
possessed, though Bruner is careful never to say that in so many words intially. Indeed
Bruner explains that Emily was suffering from something that neither medicine nor
psychology could explain, and that Father Moore as well as her family realized this and
tried to help in another way. Several flashbacks show how this began. Alone in her
dorm room one night, at 3:00 AM, she smells a strange burning smell from the hallway.
When she checks on it, she sees the door open and shut by itself several times. When
she goes back to her room, she sees a jar of pencils and pens move by itself.
Additionally, her covers roll themselves down, and a great weight seems to press down
on her, a force which also proceeds to choke her and seemingly to possess her
momentarily. Through these episodes she wonders if they are really happening or if it is
just a hallucination she is experiencing. She suffers more "visions", is hospitalized, and
diagnosed with epilepsy. She is given anti-seizure medications which she claims do not
work. Her
visions continue, as do
her severe
bodily contortions.
She leaves school and returns to live with her parents. She and her parents become
convinced she is not epileptic or mentally ill but is possessed by demons. They ask for
their local parish priest to be called in to perform an exorcism, and the Church agrees.
The prosecution counters that all this could be explained by a combination of epilepsy
(the
contortions)
and
psychosis
(the
visions).
Meanwhile, Bruner begins to experience strange occurrences in her apartment at 3:00
AM, including strange smells and sounds. Father Moore warns her that she may be
targeted by demons for possibly exposing them. Later in the film Father Moore explains
that 3:00 AM is the "witching hour" which evil spirits use to mock the Holy Trinity.
Significantly, it is the opposite of 3:00 PM, traditionally taken to be the hour at which
Jesus
died.
Seeing that the prosecution is putting up a seemingly solid medical case, Bruner
decides to try to show that Emily may have actually been possessed. She calls in an
anthropologist, Dr. Sadira Adani, to testify about various cultures' beliefs about spiritual
possession.

A medical doctor present during the exorcism comes forward to reveal an audio tape
made during the rite. The priest is then called to the stand to testify. The tape is played
and the movie then flashes back to the exorcism. It is performed on Halloween night
because Father Moore believes it might be easier to draw out the demons on that night.
The priest, Emily's boyfriend, and her father are in the room. Emily is tied to the bed.
The priest uses holy water and various words from the Rituale Romanum. She speaks
in tongues, including Latin, German, Ancient Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic. Several cats
run into the room, jumping on the priest and knocking him down. Emily breaks her ties
and jumps out the window, running into the barn. They follow her. Inside the barn, they
are subjected to more supernatural phenomena such as unnatural gusts of wind and
demonic screams and voices. The demon inside Emily refuses to name itself after
repeated demands from the presiding Father but finally reveals contemptuously that
there are not one but six demons. They go on to identify themselves in dramatic
fashion, naming themselves one after another in dual voices from Emily. They identify
themselves as the demons that possessed Cain, Nero, and Judas Iscariot and one of
the Legion. Beyond that two demons name themselves directly as Belial, and "Lucifer,
the
devil
in
the
flesh."
The film returns to the court room. The priest says that after this, Emily refused another
exorcism but also refused to take her anti-psychotic medication, having accepted her
fate. She died a few weeks later. The prosecutor contends that her speaking in tongues
can be explained by her having gone through Catholic Catechism, in which she could
have learned the ancient languages, and that she had studied German in high school.
The priest admits that it might be possible that she could have learned these languages
in
school.
Bruner then wants to call the doctor as a witness, but he does not show. She walks
outside and sees him on the street. He says he can no longer testify, but he does
believe in demons. Before he can explain he is hit by a car and killed. Later that night
Bruner's boss tells her she has ruined the whole trial and that if she recalls the priest to
the
stand
she
will
be
fired.
Nevertheless, Bruner calls the priest back to the stand the next day. He reads a letter
that Emily wrote him before she died. In the letter Emily describes another vision she
had, the morning after the exorcism. She walks out of the house and sees the Virgin
Mary, who tells her that although the demons will not leave her, she can leave her body
and end her suffering. However, the apparition goes on to say, if she returns to her body
she will help to prove to the world that God and the Devil are real. She chooses to
return. She concludes the letter by saying "People say that God is dead, but how can
they think that if I show them the Devil?" She then receives stigmata, which the priest
believes is a sign of God's love for her, but the prosecution counters that she could have
received the stigmata wounds from a barbed wire fence on her property.
Father Moore is ultimately found guilty; however, on a recommendation from the jury,
the judge agrees to a sentence of time served. In modern American legal practice, juries

are only allowed to answer questions specifically directed to them, though sometimes
they are asked separately to sentence defendants. The jury's recommendation in this
fictional
case
does
not
follow
American
practice.
Bruner is offered a partnership at her firm for saving Father Moore from extended jail
time, but she refuses and in fact quits. She goes with Father Moore to Emily's grave,
where he has put a quote (which she recited to him the day before she died) from the
second chapter twelfth verse of Philippians on her grave: "work out your own salvation
with fear and trembling".

Martin Vail (Richard Gere) is a prominent, cynical defense attorney in Chicago who
loves the public spotlight and does everything he can to get his high-paying clients off
crimes they commit on legal technicalties. One day, Vail sees a news report about the
arrest of Aaron Stampler (Edward Norton), a young, stuttering, simpleton altar boy
accused of murdering the beloved and hightly respected Archbishop Rushman (Stanley
Anderson) of the Catholic Church in Chicago. As a result, Vail jumps at the chance to
represent
the
young
man
pro-bono.
At first, the spotlight-loving Vail is interested primarily in the publicity that the case will
bring, yet during his meetings at the county jail with Aaron, Vail comes to believe that
his client is truly innocent, much to the chagrin of the prosecutor (and Vail's former
lover),
Janet
Venable
(Laura
Linney).
As the murder trial begins, Vail discovers that powerful civic leaders, including the
corrupt District Attorney John Shaughnessy (John Mahoney) as well as the mayor and
even the regional governor, have lost millions of dollars in real estate investments due
to a decision by the Archbishop not to develop on certain church lands. The Archbishop
received numerous death threats as a result. Vail also learns through the grapevine that
the archbishop had been sexually abusing altar boys, including Stampler.
Introducing this evidence, while it would make Stampler more sympathetic to the jury,
would also give his client a motive for murder, something the prosecution otherwise has
lacked.
The trial does not proceed well for the defense, as there is considerable evidence
against Stampler since he was found running from the crime scene of the Archbishop's
apartment with blood splattered all over his clothes, and he claims not to remember
anything about the murder. However, public opinion holds Stampler almost certainly
guilty and there are denials by the public about the Archbishop's true nature of being a
pedophile.
After Vail sneaks into the Archbishop's apartment to look for more evidence, he finds a
pornographic videotape of Aaron Stampler with another alter boy and a teenage girl,
named Linda, performing in sexual acts while the Archbishop is behind the camera

filming everything. Vail anonymously sends a copy of it to Janet knowing that she will
introduce it as evidence, against the advice of D.A. John Shaughnessy who wants to
keep his dirty dealings with Archbishop Rushman hidden at any cost.
When Vail confronts his client and accuses him of having lied, Aaron breaks down
crying and suddenly transforms into a new persona: a violent, foul-mouthed sociopath
who calls himself "Roy." He confesses to the murder of the Archbishop for the years of
molestation and abuse. "Roy" then throws Vail against a wall of his jail cell, injuring him.
When this incident is over, Aaron Stampler reemerges and appears to have no
recollection of it. Molly Arrington (Frances McDormand), the psychiatrist examining
Aaron, is convinced he suffers from multiple personality disorder due to childhood
abuse by his own father, in which apparently resurfaced following the molestation of the
Archbishop upon him. However, Vail realizes that he cannot enter an insanity plea
during
an
ongoing
trial.
As a result, Vail begins to sets up a confrontation in court by dropping hints about the
Archbishop's true nature as well as Aaron's multi-personality disorder. At the climax,
Vail puts Aaron on the witness stand where he gently probes him in direct examination
over his unhappy childhood and troubled dealings with the Archbishop. During crossexamination, after Janet Venable questions him harshly, Aaron turns into Roy in open
court and charges at her, threatening to snap her neck if anyone comes near him.
Aaron is subdued by courthouse marshals and is rushed back to his holding cell.
In light of Aaron's apparent insanity, the judge (Alfre Woodard) dismisses the jury in
favor of a bench trial and then finds Aaron not guilty by reason of mental insanity, and
remands him to a maximum security mental hospital. Yet afterwords, Janet is fired from
her job by her boss for allowing the corrupt dealings of the Archbishop to be made
public as well as the sexual abuse of alter boys that both the Catholic Church and the
city
council
have
been
trying
to
keep
under
wraps.
In the final scene, Vail visits Aaron in his cell to tell him this news. Aaron says he recalls
nothing of what happened in the courtroom, having again "lost time." However, just as
Vail is leaving, Aaron asks him to: "tell Miss Venable I hope her neck is okay," which is
not something that Aaron should have been able to remember if he had "lost time." Due
to this slip, Vail points this out, whereupon Aaron Stampler grins slyly and reveals that
he has been pretending to be insane the whole time. No longer stuttering or speaking in
a Southern accent, the murderous but perfectly sane Aaron admits that he didn't make
up the identity of Roy... he made up the character of Aaron. Aaron Stampler now admits
to having murdered Archbishop Rushman, as well as his girlfriend, Linda, whom the
cleric also had molested. Aware that he would not get away with killing the Archbishop,
Aaron made up his simpleton personality to gain sympathy from his lawyer as well as
the judge and jury, and when his scheme become compromised, he made up the name
of 'Roy' (his real dominant and sociopath personality) to make it appear that he
committed the murder under a split personality (which Aaron really doesn't have).
Stunned and disillusioned at how he was so easily fooled and manipulated by his own
client, Vail walks away, with Aaron/Roy taunting him from the cell. Vail leaves the

courthouse through the back door and takes a taxi away, now more angry and cynical
then ever, but ashamed to be in the public light anymore.