Movie Talk: 12 Angry Men

Movie Talk: 12 Angry Men

by Paul Adams

            When someone asks me what my favorite movie of all time is, I have a few answers I like to give out, but among them is the classic 12 Angry Men from 1957, starring Henry Fonda and directed by Sidney Lumet. The movie’s plot is about as minimalist as it gets, with almost the entire film taking place in one room with a bathroom attached, and the cast is primarily made up of the titular twelve men who have been called to jury duty. None of the men even have given names until the last line of the film.

The “plot,” if you will, is them deciding the guilt of a young man accused of killing his father. On the surface level, the case seems pretty cut and dry that he is guilty, but Henry Fonda’s character, only known as Juror #8, is not so sure, preventing the jury from reaching a unanimous decision. The rest of the movie details the jury going back and forth over every detail of the case until at last every member comes to question their own preconceived notions and prejudices, eventually all siding with Fonda.

The movie serves two primary themes, firstly, it tackles the importance of due process and why being careful in judgments and decisions of this magnitude is so essential to a court system. The movie does not end with any clear statement on whether the defendant is innocent or guilty, it simply concludes that the case is not clear enough to make such a statement at all. Although a myriad of strong evidence is presented that to most in the jury room proves him unquestionably guilty, Juror #8, and his growing number of allies, go through and poke holes in just how unquestionable it all is. The movie serves to demonstrate just how much power a jury can have a single person’s life, and why they need to truly think and analyze the situation instead of leaping to a rash decision. In a day and age when a single accusation equals undeniable guilt in the minds of many, and far too many are quick to condemn at even the slightest semblance of corruption, this is an important message to remember.

This movie also acts as a character study for the twelve men in the room, and everything is carefully laid out to tell you about them. Not a line is out of place, not an outfit is unplanned, their speech patterns and mannerisms all give you an idea of their characters, and even their seating arrangement is plotted out for maximum effect. For the sake of brevity and understanding, I will list the characters first, describe them, and then give them quick nicknames by which I will be referring to them from here on out.

1.     Juror 1 is the predesignated leader of the discussions. He wants to do his job and do it well, but is a little inadequate to the task. He primarily acts as an attempted peacekeeper during the more heated discussions. I’ll call him Leader.

2.     Juror 2 starts out as a wishy-washy character with little to no backbone, just following the crowd and quailing under pressure from the more forceful jurors. As the movie goes on, however, he becomes one of the first to switch their vote and quickly becomes one of the fiercest defenders of Juror 8’s cause. Since he was played by the character’s voice actor and behaves in much the same way, I’ll call him Piglet.

3.     Juror 3 is more or less the main antagonist. The staunchest claimer that the defendant is undeniably guilty and the last to rescind his vote, Juror 3 is rude, abrasive, and hostile to those around him. As the movie reaches its climax, it is revealed that he had a falling out with his own son and is projecting his own situation onto the case that he is supposed to be unbiased towards. I will call him Bias.

4.     Juror 4, like 3, is also one of the last to rescind his vote, however, he does so for the opposite reasons. He is analytical and intelligent, wearing thick-rimmed glasses and a clean suit. Unlike some of the others, you can tell he has thought through every single detail of the case before casting his vote, making him more akin to Juror 8 despite their differing views. I will call him Thinker.

5.     Juror 5 is one of our more quickly swayed individuals. Coming from the slums himself, he finds himself relating to the kid more and more as they examine the case. Although, this presents a little bias akin to Juror 3, it also allows him to put up a dissenting opinion whenever another tries to put forward a blanket statement about kids in “that” situation, and allows him insight into some of the details relating to that life. I will call him Slums.

6.     Juror 6 is probably the only member who doesn’t seem to have any defined attributes at all. He is mostly agreeable, and comes over to Fonda’s side about the same time as a number of others, but nothing about him stands out. I will call him Blank.

7.     Juror 7 represents another dangerous mindset when going into jury service. Unlike Bias who goes in with a personal bias, he goes in not caring at all. He is far more concerned with his baseball game later that day, and just wants to get out of there as soon as possible. He only changes his vote when more than half have gone over to Fonda’s side, leading him to be called out by Juror 10 (one of Fonda’s allies) who demands that he change his vote because he means it and not just to follow the crowd. I’m going to call him Baseball.

8.     Juror 8 is our protagonist, played by Henry Fonda. He goes into the case with an open mind, willing to give the kid every benefit of the doubt. While he doesn’t necessarily believe that the kid is innocent, he’s not so convinced of his guilt either. Fonda is a perfectly fitting name for him.

9.     Juror 9 is an older man, the first to switch over to Fonda’s side, and one of the most calm and collected of the bunch. Like Fonda and Thinker, he tends to think through the situation before acting, and is one of the leading voices of reason. I will call him Wiseman, due to his age and wisdom.

10.  Juror 10 is the racist (or at least bigot) of the bunch. Like Bias and Thinker, he is one of the last to switch over, and the meat of most of his arguments are “of course the kid did it. You know what ‘those’ people are like.” He represents those who go into a jury with their minds clouded by the demographic of those involved rather than seeing them as people. The kid’s race or whatever is kept uncertain throughout to movie to show that this mentality is dangerous in a jury no matter who is bringing it or who the defendant is. I will call him Racist.

11.  Juror 11 is the only character with a clear ethnicity outside of general “American.” He identifies himself as a German immigrant, and as such often shares the role of empathizing with the kid’s plight as Slums through being in similar circumstances. Likewise, like Slums, it does carry some bias, but it also allows him some insight to bring to the table. I will call him Foreign.

12.  And finally we have Juror 12, a cocky salesman more interested in pitching his product to his fellow jurors than in the case at hand. At the start of the movie he is loud and arrogant, being one of the more vocal members, but towards the end, proves to be one of the more spineless, flipflopping back and forth between guilty and not guilty. I will call him Salesman.

Now, so many things about the way these characters are set up is essential to making this movie work. First of all, at first glance it seems like all of these characters are of the exact same demographic: middle-aged white men. Outside of cosmetic differences, you cannot particularly tell any of them apart in that opening scene. While in most movies, this would be seen as a weakness, here it is part of the film’s power. On one hand, it further illustrates the point of the movie, that things are not always as simple as they appear on the surface. Just like the case looked black-and-white on the surface, but as they kept digging found it to be a lot more hazy than they thought, these twelve characters also look all the same on the surface, but the more time we spend with them, we start to see each as a unique, fully realized individual far different from those around them. And just like we don’t really get to see much of the case ourselves so can’t form our own preconceived biases about it, the characters’ shared demographic also prevents us from forming a bias toward or against any of the characters right from the get go (at least none that we wouldn’t have toward any of the others). I feel this could work with any demographic, really, but I do consider it essential to the core of the story that they do all remain the same as each other.

The seating arrangement is also carefully plotted out to fully accentuate the characters’ personalities. Leader, of course, is positioned at the head of the table, being the designated leader of the jury, while Baseball sits opposite him at the other end of the table, giving him all the room he needs to lean back in his chair and demonstrate just how much he doesn’t care. At Leader’s right and left hand sit Piglet and Salesman, one who starts out meek and cowardly but develops into a fierce defender staring right across the table at another who starts out cocky and arrogant but soon turns into a weak-willed flip-flopper. Racist and Thinker face each other in the center of the table, allowing them to dominate the room any time they speak, and placing them in prime positions toward the end, when Racist launches into a bigoted, hate-filled rant, during which all but Thinker turn their backs on Racist, leaving Thinker to calmly and firmly to shut him down and tell him to never speak again. The face that Thinker was staring straight across the table at Racist during all of this just added further weight to the imagery of the scene. It helps that Slums and Foreign were positioned on Thinker and Racist’s respective left sides during all of this.

Fonda, despite being the protagonist, is placed at the far back corner of the table, the one spot where he could most easily be overlooked, adding the room’s staging to the image of him as a single solitary voice speaking out against the popular opinion. His first supporter, Wiseman, is placed on his immediate left, siding with him not only in thought, but also in body. His strongest opponent, Bias, is placed across the table from him, but also toward the head of the table, not only centering him in the midst of the popular opinion, but making sure that when they face off with each other, they have to talk over the people between them, making sure their fight never becomes isolated from the group. Fonda’s position in the far back, making him easy to overlook, is accentuated by Blank sitting in the other back corner, right across the table from him, the only character to get overlooked by the plot itself.

Above all else, every character represents an archetype, twelve different mindsets one can have going into an important decision-making position like this. We have characters like Thinker who cut out all emotion and look only at the facts, thinking through the problem thoughtfully and analytically. We also have characters like Fonda and Wiseman who also use logic and reason, but who also put enough emotion into their reason to still care about the person they might be condemning. We have characters like Racist and Bias, who cloud their judgment with personal prejudice, both on a general and more personal scale. There are people like Foreign and Slums who can find a part of themselves in the situation, and can either bring a different sort of bias to the table, or bring an insight otherwise not considered by those who do not. There are also people like Piglet or Salesman, weak-willed crowd followers until they find a conviction they can really stand for or self-confident wheeler-dealers who fold under pressure. Sometimes there are the Leaders who want to do their best, but just aren’t quite up to the task, and there are Baseballs who care more about their own lives than the case they preside over. And sometimes there are Blanks, the ordinary people who don’t have much important to say, but are still a part of the process.

All in all, 12 Angry Men is one of my favorite movies. Tightly crafted, with well-written characters and dialogue, and a strong message to share. Old but timeless. You should definitely check it out if you get the chance.

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