Anatomy of a Murder (1959)

ANATOMY OF A MURDER is a mystery courtroom drama, which, in one explicit manner, deals with issues of sex and rape. The film was based on the 1958 novel of the same name by Michigan Supreme Court Justice John D. Voelker.One former local prosecutor has taken a peculiar case. Specifically, an army lieutenant has confessed to killing his wife's rapist. The lieutenant, with the help of his new defense attorney, claims that he does not remember the murder. The main feature of the defendant is temporary mental incapacity. However, some visible facts are not on his side....The story is interesting and somewhat realistic. It was complemented with a sharp dialogue and explicit themes. Mr. Preminger has presented a dramatic, but a proper and comprehensive judicial process. He has pointed, through some notable scenes, the difference between law and justice. The protagonists are shifty characters in an uncertain courtroom drama. The conflict is reduced to a battle between prosecutors and defense counsel, through comic theatricality and mutual insinuations.James Stewart as Paul Biegler is a clever and resourceful lawyer. The protagonist who, with his petty bourgeois, regularly draws aces from the hole. Mr. Stewart has offered, as usual, very good performance. Lee Remick as Laura Manion is rather unconvincing as a faithful and flirty wife at the same time. The complexity is perhaps the biggest flaw of her character. However, I think that Mr. Preminger has wanted to provoke an ironic attitude towards her character by the audience. George C. Scott as Claude Dancer is a skilled and consistent prosecutor, who has become a sort of antagonist. Ben Gazzara as Lt. Frederick Manion is a cold and nervous defendant. Joseph N. Welch as Judge Weaver, despite his sporadic cynicism, is too stereotypical character.This is a bit tiring, but very interesting trial, which, through ironic and cynical attitudes, solves the mystery.

James Stewart plays Biegler, attorney of Manion (Ben Gazzara), charged with the murder of a man who reportedly raped Manion's wife Laura (Lee Remick).The plot could have made for standard genre schlock (think Joel Schumacher's A Time to Kill), but Anatomy of a Murder is sly, ironic, rich in psychological detail and characterization, focusing on the chess-like courtroom tactics between Biegler and the prosecutor (George C. Scott).A lesser, more obvious movie would have made the defendant a sympathetic, righteous avenger and his wife as pure as the driven snow; here they are both unsavory, untrustworthy types. And Biegler is not a man on a mission, just a professional who tries to do his job at the best of his considerable abilities. Stewart is wonderful, of course, and the rest of the cast is on par.9/10

Anatomy of a Murder (1959) is described by critic Nick Pinkerton as "maybe more universally loved by law students than by cineastes." It is also enjoyed by people who are both film aficionados and former- law students. The film dramatizes the trial of an army lieutenant who shot and killed a resort owner after he raped his wife. We see none of this violence, so the action is in the dialogue and the emotions. Here, the film is a success- the acting and dialogue is smooth and believable, heavy but eased with occasional wisecracks. I watched Witness for the Prosecution (1957) at about the same time and thought the ending lacked these qualities; I was quite satisfied with Anatomy of a Murder.Not showing us any of the violence, the film allows the viewer to piece together what happened along with James Stewart's character. We meet the lieutenant, described by Stewart as hostile and insolent, not very likable. We meet his wife, a "free and easy" type, attractive and friendly. The film teases us with possibilities- the prosecution suggests sex between the woman and victim was consensual, that her injuries were inflicted by her husband. But we know she passed a lie detector test and other evidence supports her story. Generally, the film makes us question whether the lieutenant really was under irresistible impulse- we get the feeling he wasn't, and it's debatable as to how much Stewart's character believed this himself, as he was coaching him on defence strategies in an early scene. As we piece together the mystery, the attention to detail is commendable- the lawyers press for details, addressing inconsistencies, as we see when Stewart wants to know if the dog was in or out of the truck during the sexual assault. This is, as the title suggests, where the anatomizing factors in.Some of that detail gets rather personal- when George C. Scott's prosecutor grills the lieutenant's wife on whether she always wears underwear, and relentlessly demands another female witness to say the victim was her lover. From one perspective he's doing his job, from another he is prosecuting women in general; with extensive testimony on how the wife was dressed and behaved, we see the old stereotypes and the old attitude that it was either consensual or that she was asking for it. Interestingly, Anatomy of a Murder dramatizes not only a murder trial but an old-fashioned rape trial, a sort of two-for-one affair. In doing so, it uses blunt and courageous language defying censorship- sexual details, use of words like "slut" and "bitch." The result is a powerful film, a trailblazer of sorts that retains its impact.

One night in 1959, Laura Manion (Lee Remick) returns home and tells her husband that she's been raped. Enraged, he husband grabs a gun and kills the man she accused of the crime. When arrested, Frederick Manion (Ben Gazzara) claims that he didn't remember any of it, but nobody really believes his story. His wife turns to a relatively unknown country lawyer for help, and after meeting with the Manion's, Paul Biegler (Jimmy Stewart) agrees to take the case. It's never clear whether or not even he believes his client's story, but either way, Biegler is determined to get the man exonerated. Many law professors consider this film to be the most accurate depiction of a trial ever fictionalized on film. Likewise, the Academy was also very impressed, giving Anatomy of A Murder seven Oscar nominations, but does the film really stand the test of time? For 1959, the Manion's were as promiscuous and dysfunctional a couple as could be on film, however in 2015, they are rather tame. That's not the only thing that gets lost in time, as the laws surrounding the insanity defense have also changed, making the whole premise around this trial more than somewhat outdated. This film simply doesn't have the impact in 2015, that it did in 1959, but that doesn't mean it's not entertaining. Jimmy Stewart stars as Defense Attorney, Paul Biegler, who unfortunately isn't the most interesting man in the world. He's a very bland character, without much depth, but he is an intelligent lawyer, who finds every trick and loophole in the book to defend his client. Jimmy Stewart was a tall lanky man with a strange voice, who I thought was a natural when it came to physical comedy, but Stewart preferred to play a more intelligent character, especially later in his career, and Paul Biegler is a textbook example of that. Anatomy of A Murder is on almost every top 100 list you can find, and in it's time it absolutely belonged there, but by 2015 standards, it's very long, tame, and outdated, despite the excellent story and depiction of a courtroom.