Find Me Guilty (2006)

I've reviewed 3700+ films on this site, and I have seen a good many more than that.There are some movies that just don't hold my interest. If I rent them or tune in to watch them, I find myself doing something else while they're on. What do these films have in common? They're lousy."Find Me Guilty," a 2006 film directed by Sidney Lumet, is a long movie that is beautifully cast, has a strong script, and a great director. It's a triple threat. Is it the greatest film ever made? No. Did it hold my interest? Yes, definitely.Surprisingly, the star is Vin Diesel, an action star who turns in the performance of his career, guided by a director who helped him hone his performance. As Jackie DiNorscio, a gangster on trial along with about 20 of his confederates on 76 RICO violations, he is simply fantastic.This is the true story of the longest Mafia trial in history, lasting 1-3/4 years after a ten-year investigation and with 850 exhibits shown. DiNorscio was already serving a sentence; he fired his attorney and served as his own lawyer.It's Diesel's performance that carries the film, and in real life, it carried the trial, too, as he charms the pants off of the jury with his jokes, his charm, and his sincerity, to the disgust of the prosecutor (Linus Roache) who is desperate to get his case separated from the rest of the trial.The standout besides Diesel was the passionate performance of Linus Roache, a wonderful actor, familiar to me from "Law and Order," who brought intensity and power to his role as prosecutor.The other actors in the film, all very good, were Alex Rocco, Ron Silver, Peter Dinklage, Richard Portnow, Annabella Sciorra, and Raul Esparza.A director who can keep one's interest during a long film is one thing; but a director who knows how to cast, who sees the potential in actors who are not obvious choices -- that's quite another. Lumet could do both and mine both the humor and drama in what must have been a real circus of a trial.

If you were expecting another action adventure film with Vinnie Diesel, guess again. This film is one where Vin has to act, and I mean act. And he does it amazingly well. The plot is well laid out and sets a logical foundation from start to finish. While a failure at the box office, this film is one of the great underground sleepers everyone who is interested in the real history of the "Mafia" in the US should see. Vin portrays "Jackie Dee" DiNorscio, probably one of the last "Stand Up" guys in the mob, unwilling to sell out his friends and family to get a reduced sentence. In the courtroom, he is a fly in the ointment, and a pain in the judge's rear end. As his own attorney, he makes procedural and other mistakes the defense attorney's are uncomfortable with. While most of the other mobsters are okay with Jackie, Alex Rocco (as Nick Calabrese, Don of the Lucchese family) is brusque, rude, and downright condescending to him, accusing him of selling out for a deal. Throughout the trial, Vinnie remains solid, and is supported by Ben Klandis (played by Peter Dinklage). Dinklage gives an amazing performance as the dwarf attorney who is surprisingly adept at presenting his case. Ron Silver is prefect as the judge, showing only as much emotion as he needs, and trying to be fair in his rulings. Linus Roache shows us the firm, determined persona we were used to when he took over for Jack McCoy in the final seasons of Law and Order, and this was not his first time working with Vin. They were previously together in The Chronicles of Riddick. Annabella Sciorra and Alexa Palladino are also excellent in their roles as Jackie's wife and daughter. And Hat's Off to the casting department for presenting us with a list of Italian names not seen since the Godfather films. I guess they felt you had to be Italian to understand what was up at the time. Rated R for language and some brief but brutal violence, this may not be a film for the family, but it is definitely one for Vin fans and anyone who likes an unpretentious legal docudrama. Collectible? Depends on your taste.

Sidney Lumet remains, as he was, the master of the courtroom drama. But was Vin Diesel this good all along, or was it Lumet who dragged this performance out of him? Diesel delivers a character who's creepy, offensive, funny, moving and lovable.Find Me Guilty is not quite on the same level as 12 Angry Men, or the rest of Lumet's incredibly impressive filmography from the 50's, 60's and 70's, but it's compelling, entertaining and highly intelligent, and keeps the viewer in all the way through, thanks to a top notch script, and Diesel's wonderful performance. A courtroom drama this good, this entertaining and effective hasn't been seen since A Few Good Men.

This movie bugged me. What was that anyway? And what were its problems? Sure it got many ! The movie looked provocative in dealing with the monsters it had. True, it demands to look into its characters like usual human beings inside their own world. But the main problem is that it happens at the moment of taking revenge on them by us, the moment where they go to their righteous end, as the natural fairness from our very point of view. You sense anger and fear when those mean old criminals go free at the end that easily ! So it's hard to see any human type Mr. Lumet wants us to see in (Jackie DiNorscio/ Vin Diesel) and learn about. And harder to feel sympathy out of this courtroom movie.Moreover, how the logicality of the whole trial/movie has gone with the wind? It's impossible for us as viewers to BELIEVE for a second how the jury decided that the accused killers and dealers are all NOT GUILTY !! Even if it's a very known case from the 1980s, dramatically, the movie pushed me to not buy that, and to assume that those mafia bosses bribed all the jury?…Or maybe, it's Sidney Lumet's special satire... When we see all the mobsters walk joyfully in one street with the members of the jury to mingle with each other you'd conclude what vision is shown for the American society, or its big family - echoes from Lumet's (Family Business – 1989) - like it's that nation's naked truth. Which even breaking it, is a breakage for a LIFE STYLE, like their lawyer's first pleading. So, similar to Lumet's (Q & A – 1990) also, it's the case of perversely established ground (and forever). It's like Roman Polanski's films where evil is finally dominating. Or the world of Coppola's The Godfather however the mafia is axiomatic fact & ordinary part, yet with no purgation.Therefore the federal prosecutor's shouting "They're criminals" wasn't to assure sense of morality at it only. But to manifest how hopeless his character is in a world like this. Though the movie doesn't try to give us the reason HOW he has been beaten at the end ?! Since the answer of WHY is : naturally ! It could be another violent commentary on the American, explicitly incomplete, justice. So the prosecutor looked nasty while his efforts to achieve the lost justice, as the evil man of "this" world who had to lose to "our" world's real evil men !?? I told you earlier, this movie can bug cleverly. It makes you think: Maybe the mob produced it ?!!In fact, the moral dilemma was for the viewer to decide is (Jackie DiNorscio) a hero of his world or not ? The finale just answered a big YES for that and exaggerated it passionately, after living his redemption till his noble statement of willingly self-sacrifice at the end. However you'd feel : How he sacrifices for people will kill you and your kids by bullets or drugs !, How even his attempt to sacrifice was fake since he's going to jail anyhow !, and How he didn't learn about himself as long as he says "Send me to jail. I'm not guilty, but I'm used to it"!!?, Baby, you're so guilty to the backbone. And I feel I must say the same about (Sidney Lumet) here too.It was difficult to catch on the movie's message, or its type of a hero. Simply, Jackie is the only one who discovered through the whole trail that he lost everything and everyone by himself, the only one who owns love, and asks for non-conditional love. But the treatment didn't pinpoint that seriously. I sunk under so many defects. One of them is making it as a courtroom movie, which tried to be so loyally realistic also, since the normal viewer would live continual heavy defense for the mafia's sake, with a happy end for them too ! This distracted the attention to heed anything but the appearance of a heart of gold inside the personality of (DiNorscio). Not to mention the ethical complication of understanding his redemption with another possible satire about the ones whom he sacrifices for. You can't ignore that precise look into world of Italians (whom not the progeny of Italian artists, but Italian bottom) to ask what's the original basis of America exactly?, and how its crime is a victor force, and organic limb. The try of 2 movies in one is the same problem of Lumet's (The Anderson Tapes - 1971), refer to my comment about it on the IMDb : (A Political Crime Movie ? NAAAY !!). However, like that last one, Lumet uses criminals to expose something wrong in the American system but here it seemed disharmonious and annoying. It's not the movie where the evil guy goes to jail at last, it's the movie where the evil guys go to society free while the good guy is beaten and the less evil imprisoned, but none of these stories was done fairly.This is one of Lumet's less powerful movies. Marketing it as a (Comedy) tells you how they were desperate to market it anyway. They did it before with his better one (Family Business). Maybe he's making movies about subjects too hard to face or stand. Here as a director, co-writer he went to the sink to seek heroes (read : less impure) yet he did it in a movie that needed to be more emotional, concentrated, and effective.P.S : despite Diesel's good efforts, the make-up and the gray wig were heavy mask that made him a freak and devitalized his acting.