12 Angry Men: Worth Your Time?

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This week I got #6 with the random number generator, and that corresponds to the movie 12 Angry Men. I watched part of this movie last year in AP Gov, but we never got to finish it. I remember enjoying the parts of the movie that I did see, so I was pretty excited to get the chance to see the entire thing.

12 Angry Men is a pretty old movie, being made in 1957. The plot behind this film is that we follow a jury of 12 men who initially almost all agree to send a young man to death for allegedly murdering his father. Only one juror, played by Henry Fonda, disagrees in sending the boy to death without at least first talking about the crime for at least an hour. As the drama unfolds, we see the various motives behind why various jurors wanted the boy sent to death, and watch as the tension builds. That's what I think this movie does so well that most movies today neglect to do: it builds tension. When a film gets the audience to feel uncomfortable because of what's going on in the plot (as opposed to crude jokes or nudity), it is truly making a connection with its audience. Once you feel the tension, you begin to have a stake in the plot, and root for a particular outcome.

Another thing I feel 12 Angry Men does so well is developing its characters. The audience finds out so much about every juror as the debate wages on. I think that modern films decide to only focus on the main two or three characters, but this movie fully develops all 12. I honestly would not have watched this movie had I not gotten it from the random generator, simply because of when it was made. This project has made me appreciate older films so much more, and I am very thankful for that.

Totally worth your time.