In Pursuit of Justice

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Even when he was dying from lung cancer, Paul Newman always looked younger than he really was.

Most of us would consider that a blessing in a culture that worships youth and beauty, but it can be a real hindrance for an actor. True, appearing to be forever young has helped some get roles that might otherwise have gone to others, but it seems to me that, at some point, a performer wants to play roles that more closely match his/her age, with the knowledge and experience that come with it.

I mean, it seems that it would be darn near impossible to be in your 40s and try to plausibly play a twentysomething. Too much happens in the interim.

"I always thought drinkin' men lost their looks," Elizabeth Taylor said to Newman in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof." Newman was 33 when he played the part of Brick, who was probably about that age in that story but obsessed with his glory days as a high school athlete. He still looked the part (to Maggie the Cat's chagrin) — and his character even tried to do some of the things he once did only to learn that time always has its way. So does gravity. Even if it doesn't yet show in one's face.

But that's an easier assignment than being, say, in your 60s and playing a character 15 or 20 years younger. So perhaps Newman's youthful appearance worked against him at times.

When Newman made "The Verdict," which premiered on this day in 1982, he wasn't quite 60 years old. I don't know how old his character was supposed to be, but he was a lawyer and a drunk, which is not a good combination, least of all for assessing one's age. Based on things that were mentioned in the movie — when he finished law school, when he became a partner, etc. — Newman's character was probably five or six years younger than the actor.

Not really a stretch, especially for someone who was graying but whose hair hadn't turned totally white. Newman faced greater challenges in his career.

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Newman's character's story was a cautionary tale. All the failures in his life — his career, his marriage, everything — could be traced to his struggle with the bottle. But he was still in there pitching. He was mostly an ambulance chaser but a successful one. He seldom lost his cases, and a good friend and ex–teacher (Jack Warden) threw some work his way so he could keep a roof over his head and food on the table.

"The Verdict" was about one such case, a medical malpractice case that appeared to be open and shut. It was a "moneymaker," Newman's friend told him — an enticing word for a down–on–his–luck lawyer. A young woman who was about to deliver a baby was given the wrong anesthetic and was rendered comatose after choking on her own vomit. The Catholic–run hospital was willing to settle out of court, but after a visit to the hospital where the woman was being treated, Newman was determined to take the case to trial.

It was no longer about winning. It was about justice, and it was about redemption.

And the movie wasn't just about professional redemption. Charlotte Rampling was his opportunity for romantic redemption.

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I advise the student newspaper at a local community college. Recently I was having a conversation with one of the other advisers about our favorite Paul Newman movies. We compiled a predictable list until I mentioned "The Verdict," and he replied, "Yes, I forgot about that one."

We spoke of the acting — and it received plenty of recognition at the Oscars. Newman was nominated for Best Actor, and James Mason as the lead defense attorney was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

The movie was also nominated for Best Picture, Best Director (Sidney Lumet) and Best Screenplay Based on Material From Another Medium. But it didn't win any of those Oscars. It was the year of "Gandhi," and "Gandhi" claimed three of the Oscars for which "The Verdict" was nominated.

A little trivia for you now:

Warden and Edward Binns, who played a bishop, were reunited in a Lumet–directed movie. Twenty–five years earlier, they played jurors in Lumet's "12 Angry Men."

Also, the next time you see "The Verdict," watch for a young Bruce Willis. He was a courtroom observer in this, one of his first movie appearances. Look for him during Newman's closing argument.

(Side note: Whenever I watch "The Verdict," I think about my senior play in high school, Ayn Rand's "The Night of January 16th." I played the judge in that production, and everyone had to stand when I entered or left the room. I thought that was cool.)

He That Troubleth His Own House ...

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Matthew Harrison Brady (Fredric March): I do not think about things I do not think about.

Henry Drummond (Spencer Tracy): Do you ever think about things that you do think about?

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I remember one Christmas when I was maybe 14 or 15, and my mother gave me a copy of Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee's acclaimed stage script for the play, "Inherit the Wind," which was made into a movie that premiered on this day in 1960.

Mom frequently gave me books that she thought I would like, even if most people thought the books were beyond my years. They probably would have been right, too, if the subject had been anyone other than myself, but I was always reading things that, in most cases, would have been more appropriate for someone a few years older. Mom knew that, and she encouraged me to read things that I might not fully comprehend, that I might need to ask questions about — knowing that I would probably comprehend most, if not all, of it. And she was usually right about that.

Besides, "Inherit the Wind" was based on the famous (or infamous, depending on your point of view) Scopes monkey trial that took place 90 years ago, in July 1925, and Mom knew I was always a history buff. She knew I had read about the Scopes trial before. I don't think we had studied it in school yet, though, so she knew there was a chance I might need to know a few things to fill in the gaps in my mind.

The trial — in a case that challenged a law that prohibited the teaching of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution in a state–funded school — drew three–time presidential nominee William Jennings Bryan and famed trial lawyer Clarence Darrow to Dayton, Tennessee, to serve as the legal counsel for the two sides. With oratorical firepower like that in town, the press of the day was there as well. It was the Trial of the Century — or, at least, the First Quarter of a Century.

(Did I say it was based on the trial? That's an understatement. It was practically a transcript of the trial, with the debates between Bryan and Darrow picked up virtually word for word.)

All that activity must have been unsettling for Dayton. In the most recent census, its population was slightly more than 7,000. I'm guessing it was considerably smaller in 1925.

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The town's name was changed in the play — to Hillsboro, Tennessee — referred to as "Heavenly Hillsboro" by the press in the story.

The Bryan character was seen locally as the defender of traditional beliefs and values; in the movie, his character was played by Frederic March, and he received a hero's welcome when he and his wife arrived in town.

An equal and opposite reaction was given to the Darrow character, who was perceived as a threat to those beliefs and values. He was played by Spencer Tracy.

You don't have to watch much of "Inherit the Wind" to see clear parallels between the conflict portrayed in the movie and the many social conflicts that permeate our politics today.

"The movie casts the battle as a struggle between the followers of a fundamentalist preacher ... and the snowy–haired agnostic ... who believes Darwinism is as 'incontrovertible as geometry,' as indeed it seems to well over 99 percent of the world's scientists," wrote film critic Roger Ebert.

(Actually, Ebert could have been describing both sides in just about any modern debate, it seems to me.)

In fact, the play does seem to have accurately forecast 21st–century attitudes. The fundamentalists were ridiculed, as they are today, as being hopelessly out of step with modern thinking.

Thinking? The movie was about the right to think, and Gene Kelly's character believed it was in great jeopardy. "There's only one man in the whole town who thinks," he complained, "and he's in jail."

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There were others in the cast, of course, including a character who served as the defendant (in the movie, that was Dick York) and Kelly as a reporter for a fictional newspaper, the Baltimore Herald, based on the very real H.L. Mencken and the newspaper that employed him, the Baltimore Sun, which provided financial support for the defense. Harry Morgan played the presiding judge, and there were some witnesses. Nearly all the witnesses testified for the prosecution. The judge ruled that testimony from the defense's academic witnesses was irrelevant, and the defense's only witness was the prosecuting attorney himself.

For the most part, the movie was a two–man show, and you couldn't have asked for two better actors to represent their generation. Tracy received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor; March didn't get a nomination but deserved one as well. (He enjoyed his share of Oscar success, though, receiving five Best Actor nominations in his career — and winning twice.)

("Inherit the Wind" received three other Oscar nominations. Nedrick Young and Harold Jacob Smith were nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, Ernest Laszlo was nominated for Best Black and White Cinematography, and Frederic Knudtson was nominated for Best Film Editing.)

Writing a few months after a similar court trial in Dover, Pennsylvania, Ebert observed that the movie was "a film that rebukes the past when it might also have feared the future. Beliefs that seemed like ancient history to [director Stanley] Kramer have had a surprising resiliency; two recent polls show that 38 percent of American teenagers believe 'God created humans pretty much in their present form within the last 10,000 years or so,' and 54 percent of American adults doubt that man evolved from earlier species. There is hardly a politician in the land with courage enough to state that they are wrong."

Ebert wrote that in 2006. The public's conclusions may or may not have changed in that time — but my guess is that there are quite a few politicians who would be willing to challenge the validity of those conclusions today.

Some might take a page from Spencer Tracy's dialogue in the movie. "The Bible is a book," he asserted at one point. "It's a good book, but it is not the only book."

A Routine Courtroom Drama

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"The Wreck of the Mary Deare," which premiered 55 years ago today, might have been an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

MGM approached Hitchcock about directing it, and the idea was tempting. Hitch had wanted to work with Gary Cooper for quite awhile, but, after reviewing the script, he reached the conclusion that it could not be done without becoming a routine courtroom drama.

So Hitchcock opted out and began another project, this one with Cary Grant — "North by Northwest."

Michael Anderson ended up as the director, but, in spite of any efforts to the contrary, I don't think the finished product varied from what Hitchcock anticipated.

If you saw "The Perfect Storm," "Titanic" and "The Caine Mutiny," you probably have a pretty good grasp of the story. "The Wreck of the Mary Deare" combined elements of all three.

There were more than two people in the cast, but, ultimately, the story was about Cooper and Charlton Heston.

Heston's character was the captain of a salvage ship that was nearly struck by a freighter that seemed to be abandoned. Heston went aboard the ship looking for property to plunder and encountered its looney captain, played by Cooper.

Despite their efforts, the Mary Deare sank.

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Anderson deserved credit, too, for keeping the suspense level up through much of the movie — I'm sure his experience with special effects ("Around the World in 80 Days,") helped. But, ultimately, the story turned out the way Hitchcock expected it would.

Heston's character believed Cooper's character when he claimed that the ship had been sabotaged to collect insurance on the cargo — which had been unloaded earlier — but the court did not. That led Cooper and Heston to dive to the sunken ship in search of evidence to prove Cooper was telling the truth.

Cooper worked right up until his death from cancer in 1961. He made other movies after he made "The Wreck of the Mary Deare," but he isn't remembered for any of them. He is remembered for "Sergeant York," "Pride of the Yankees" and "High Noon," and those movies, as well as a handful of others, were his legacy. And that is as it should be.

He should not be remembered for a routine courtroom drama.

When the Inmates Ran the Asylum

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Ralph (Robert Christian): I was in that taxi cab, but I didn't rob it. It was my cousin. He's crazy.

Arthur (Al Pacino): What's his name?

Ralph: I don't know. I mean he lives out in Hillsberry.

Arthur: You don't know your cousin's name?

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In many ways, Norman Jewison's "... And Justice For All," which debuted on this day in 1979, was better suited for current times, given its focus on corruption and injustice.

There is always an audience for that sort of theme, I suppose, because some people are predisposed to believe they have been victimized in some way, and I don't really see that changing. No matter how much we may reach for what we believe is a utopian society, human nature (being what it is) will pull in the opposite direction.

The story of "... And Justice For All" could have been written in the early 21st century. A longtime judge (played by John Forsythe, who really did look like a judge), the very picture of establishment privilege, was accused of rape. And the fact was that he was guilty, although he didn't say so to anyone.

He was already loathed by just about every lawyer who worked in his courtroom, including Al Pacino's character, a defense attorney. The judge asked for Pacino to defend him because he thought it would be good public relations. He believed he would be acquitted if the attorney who was defending him in court was also known to hate him.

"Inevitably, it's going to look as if the fix is in," Roger Ebert wrote, "unless the defense is conducted by a lawyer who's clearly on record as despising Forsythe."

That's a pretty cynical way of looking at things — unless you happen to be the product of a corrupt system.

It's also kind of daring for director Norman Jewison, given the many characters and subplots competing for the audience's attention.

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As Ebert observed, the movie "has so many characters doing so many things to, with and against Pacino that it's a triumph of film making when all the stories end in the same movie."

When I say there was a lot going on, you can take that to the bank.

Perhaps the wildest character was played by Jack Warden. Warden played another judge who was as crazy as any character you'll find in the movies. He was a bit of a thrill seeker, spending his lunch breaks sitting on the ledge of the courthouse's fifth floor and flying helicopters, carefully calculating how far he could travel and return safely on the fuel he had — and then flying a little farther than that, just to see if he could make it back.

He took Pacino on such a ride — and, on at least one occasion, he fired a gun in his courtroom.

"Gentlemen," he said, "need I remind you you're in a court of law?"

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I never have figured out the purpose of Warden's character in that movie. His helicopter flight with Pacino may have been good for a little comic relief, but, otherwise, I saw little relevance to the story.

Unless the point was that the lunatics were (and still are) running the asylum. Of course, that could have been it — or there could have been more to it, and I just didn't notice with all the competing subplots.

"... And Justice For All" received two Oscar nominations — Pacino for Best Actor and Valerie Curtin and Barry Levinson for Best Original Screenplay — and lost both.

A Flawless Dramatization of a Murder Trial

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"Twelve people go off into a room: 12 different minds, 12 different hearts, from 12 different walks of life; 12 sets of eyes, ears, shapes and sizes. And these 12 people are asked to judge another human being as different from them as they are from each other. And in their judgment, they must become of one mind — unanimous. It's one of the miracles of man's disorganized soul that they can do it, and in most instances, do it right well. God bless juries."

Parnell (Arthur O'Connell)

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Jimmy Stewart is one of my favorite actors, and he gave many astonishing performances in his career.

One of my favorites was in Otto Preminger's "Anatomy of a Murder," which premiered on this date in 1959. My personal opinion is that it was flawless.

In the movie, Ben Gazzara played a young soldier who killed a man for allegedly raping and beating his wife (Lee Remick). One small problem, though. No evidence of a rape could be found. Stewart, a small–town lawyer, was retained to defend him in court, and Stewart discovered via interviews and his own observations that the defendant was jealous and possessive and his wife apparently had been promiscuous.

That would be a hard sell in court.

The alternative theory of what happened went something like this: Remick and the man were lovers. Gazzara found out about it, killed the man and beat up Remick, then coerced her into backing up his version of events. That would sound more logical to a small–town jury, especially given Gazzara's defense.

Gazzara said he was not guilty because he had been in the grip of an irresistible impulse, a rather complicated mostly legal concept that seemed to offer a plausible explanation for what happened — but was seen as hard for juries to get their minds around.

And I speak from experience.

At one time, I covered the police beat in a rather modestly sized county in Arkansas, which also meant covering local trials from time to time. In that capacity, I observed the usual courtroom procedures, from selecting a jury to examining and cross–examining witnesses.

I witnessed attempts to explain complicated legal concepts to largely rural juries, and I have a great deal of respect for any lawyer who tries to do it. It's a lot more difficult than a casual observer might think.

I also got to observe judicial sidebars, in which the attorneys for both sides would approach the bench and confer on issues, usually out of earshot of those in the courtroom.

Such a conference in "Anatomy of a Murder" never fails to amuse me. It concerned the alleged rape of the defendant's wife and the panties she had worn that night, which were unaccounted for.

The rape had been mentioned in a witness' testimony, and the judge felt it was necessary, at that point, to fully address the subject of rape, and that meant introducing the topic of the panties.

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"There's a certain light connotation attached to the word 'panties,'" the judge said. "Can we find another name for them?"

"I never heard my wife call 'em anything else," the local prosecuting attorney said.

The judge looked at Stewart. "Mr. Biegler?"

"I'm a bachelor, your honor," Stewart replied.

"That's a great help," the judge said and turned to the prosecuting attorney from the state capitol (George C. Scott). "Mr. Dancer?"

"When I was overseas during the war," he said, "I learned a French word. I'm afraid that might be slightly suggestive."

"Most French words are," said the judge.

Always makes me laugh. Never fails.

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Then the judge announced to the court, "For the benefit of the jury, but more especially for the spectators, the garment mentioned in the testimony was, to be exact, Mrs. Manion's panties."

As one might expect, hoots of laughter greeted this announcement, and the judge continued.

"I wanted to get your snickering over and done with. This pair of panties will be mentioned again over the course of this trial, and when it is, there will not be one laughter, one snicker, one giggle or even one smirk in my courtroom. There is nothing comic about a pair of panties that resulted in the violent death of one man and the possible incarceration of another."

That is precisely the sort of thing that the judges I covered would have said, too.

The conclusion of a courtroom drama, like that of a murder mystery, should never be revealed to someone who has not yet seen (or read) it — so, to be on the safe side, I won't tell you what happened.

I will tell you it was a very realistic depiction of a trial. It even took on some legal subjects about which I often wondered when I was covering the police beat.

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In particular, I wondered the same thing that Gazzara's character wondered when the judge instructed the jury to disregard a certain piece of testimony.

Gazzara leaned over to Stewart and whispered, "How can a jury disregard what it's already heard?"

And, in perhaps the most honest line in the movie, Stewart replied, "They can't, lieutenant. They can't."

"Anatomy of a Murder" received seven Oscar nominations, including two for Best Supporting Actor (Scott and O'Connell), but not one for the Duke Ellington jazz music that gave the movie such a distinctive flavor.

It probably wouldn't have mattered if the music had been nominated, though. It was the year of "Ben–Hur," and "Anatomy of a Murder" lost four Oscars to that movie alone.

Anatomy of a Mutiny

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"The first thing you've got to learn about this ship is that she was designed by geniuses to be run by idiots."

Lt. Keefer (Fred MacMurray)

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Sea adventures always seem to have fascinated moviegoers.

I'm not sure why that is so. Maybe it is because when there is a conflict at sea, the only choice is to resolve it somehow. There is only so much space to occupy; outside of that is miles and miles of ocean.

When a conflict occurs on dry land, there is always (well, usually) the option of going someplace else.

Things went very wrong for the fictional crew of the equally fictional USS Caine during a typhoon.

Before I say anything else about this movie, let me ask you a question: Which Humphrey Bogart performance do you think was his best, his most memorable?

Would you pick "Casablanca," which won Best Picture? Bogart was nominated for Best Actor, but he lost to Paul Lukas for "Watch on the Rhine."

Or would you pick "The African Queen," which was not nominated for Best Picture? Bogart won his only Best Actor Oscar for that one.

Would you pick a movie like "The Maltese Falcon" or "The Treasure of Sierra Madre," for which he was not nominated for Best Actor?

Or would you pick "The Caine Mutiny," which made its debut 60 years ago today? Bogart received his third and last (and perhaps most deserving) Best Actor nomination for it — but he lost to Marlon Brando for "On the Waterfront."

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For many reasons, I might be inclined to pick "The Caine Mutiny," which was a first–rate sea adventure. However, I have always seen similarities between the role Bogart played in "The Caine Mutiny" and the one he played in "The Treasure of Sierra Madre."

It may not be Bogart's best performance, but, for me, it may be his most memorable because the character is so different from the roles he usually played.

Bogart's characters were always flawed in some way. Sam Spade and Rick Blaine were in love with women they couldn't have — and they knew it. Fred C. Dobbs was consumed with the desire for wealth, and Charlie Allnut, well, he had more problems than can be mentioned here.

But even though they had personal issues, all those characters were self–assured. They could manage things well enough on their own. Captain Queeg could not. He had been under great pressure throughout his naval career, and the story of how he cracked under the strain of commanding a nondescript vessel was the story of the Caine itself.

At the heart of the story was a young, affluent ensign on his first assignment. He didn't care for the commander in charge and was glad when he was replaced by Queeg, who appeared to be more of a disciplinarian.

"Mr. Maryk," he said to Van Johnson, his executive officer, "you may tell the crew for me that there are four ways of doing things aboard my ship: The right way, the wrong way, the Navy way and my way. They do things my way, and we'll get along."

That was reassuring — temporarily — until Queeg's behavior brought his stability into question, particularly when he began rolling a pair of steel balls in his hand.

It was bad enough when, distracted by a crewman who was out of uniform, Queeg permitted the ship to go in a circle and cut its own towline. But later, when Queeg went on a preposterous search for strawberries that went missing, most of the crew began to doubt his stability.

At that point, three staffers from the Caine — Johnson, Fred MacMurray (a writer) and Robert Francis (the young ensign) — set out to report Queeg's erratic behavior to the admiral but thought better of it at the last minute.

Things reached a boiling point on board the Caine during the typhoon. Queeg froze under pressure, and Johnson relieved him of command — thus setting in motion a sequence of events that led to a court–martial for Johnson and Francis. They were represented by Jose Ferrer, who was reluctant at first. He admitted that he would prefer to prosecute.

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There were high hopes among the defendants when MacMurray's character was called to testify. He, of course, had been the one who had planted the idea of Queeg's mental instability in everyone's heads. He was a writer, they said. He had a way with words and would be able to explain to the court what it had been like on the Caine, but he wound up taking no responsibility. When he heard that Queeg had been relieved of command, MacMurray said, he was "flabbergasted."

That was a good word for the reaction of the defense, too. Later, when talking about MacMurray on the stand, Ferrer told the ship's crew, "You ought to read his testimony. He never even heard of Captain Queeg."

Ferrer's character had no choice but to put Queeg on the stand and ask him direct questions about his bizarre behavior. Queeg pulled out his steel balls and began rolling them in his hand while he testified. The point was made, and the defendants were acquitted.

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"The Caine Mutiny" was nominated for seven Oscars, but it took home none. That was unfortunate. Director Edward Dmytryk really deserved better than that.

Columbia Pictures, knowing this would be the last movie producer Stanley Kramer would make for the company, slashed the budget and relied on Bogart's reputation and the success of the book upon which the movie was based. The gamble paid off, but the financial restrictions under which he worked led Dmytryk to make — perhaps out of necessity — a great movie.

Bogart's acting achievement was only part of it. Johnson gave an astonishing performance as a foolish first officer whose intentions were good, and Francis was just as good as the naive and even more foolish ensign.

But I think that, perhaps, the most impressive performance was turned in by Dmytryk — creating a top–of–the–line movie for, essentially, bargain–basement prices.

Hollywood's Young Mr. Lincoln

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"I may not know much of law, Mr. Felder, but I know what's right and what's wrong. And I know what you're asking is wrong."

Abraham Lincoln (Henry Fonda)

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The last time I watched "Young Mr. Lincoln," which premiered 75 years ago today, it occurred to me that it is always a treat to watch Henry Fonda — especially when he is appearing in a John Ford movie.

I've heard that Fonda was usually hesitant to play historical figures, especially people like Abraham Lincoln. Supposedly, he didn't feel worthy. He didn't think he measured up.

But I can't think of any of his contemporaries who would have been a better choice to play the young Abe Lincoln — and, in 1939, with the outbreak of World War II literally only months away, folks needed a Lincoln to inspire them.

In the absence of the real thing, a surrogate was needed. Who would have been better than Henry Fonda? For that matter, who would have been a better choice to direct the movie than John Ford?

And, apparently, Fonda relaxed his policy when he learned that Ford's project told the story of Lincoln who had yet to mature into the president Americans remember today. It was not the story of Lincoln's presidency; in fact, the movie ended just before Lincoln took the oath of office.

I realize that most Americans don't know much of their own country's history, but Abraham Lincoln was larger than life, even in his lifetime. Nearly four dozen men have been president of the United States; only a handful are familiar to nearly all Americans living today, and Lincoln is one of them.

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Nevertheless, most Americans know little of his life before the presidency, and "Young Mr. Lincoln" was a wonderful opportunity for Americans of 75 years ago to learn a little about what shaped Lincoln into the man he became. It is still a wonderful opportunity for Americans to learn about their 16th president — but I wouldn't recommend it as a source for a term paper.

Ford is probably best remembered for the many movies he made with John Wayne, but he and Fonda enjoyed a productive relationship, too. Over two decades, they made seven films together. "Young Mr. Lincoln" was their first — and one of their best.

That isn't intended as a criticism. The Fonda–Ford association produced some of the greatest movies in Hollywood history. The year after the premiere of "Young Mr. Lincoln," they made "The Grapes of Wrath" together. In between, they made "Drums Along the Mohawk."

"Young Mr. Lincoln" wasn't as successful as Ford's most recent project at the time, "Stagecoach" with John Wayne, but it has been described as "a deeper, more multi–leveled work."

One of those levels that may well surprise modern viewers is the one that deals with Lincoln's love life. Both of the significant women in his adult life are important characters in "Young Mr. Lincoln" — Ann Rutledge (Pauline Moore), Lincoln's first love who might have been first lady but died of typhoid at the age of 22, and Mary Todd (Marjorie Weaver), who did become first lady.

Moore's part in the movie was short–lived, but her character's influence could be felt throughout the telling of the story of Lincoln's formative years. She died at a point in Lincoln's life when his values were being defined, and the value that comes through loud and clear is compassion.

It's a fictionalized account of Lincoln's life, of course, but Lincoln's compassion wasn't fiction. There are plenty of examples of that compassion in the true story of Lincoln's life, but it worked well as a fictional story, too, and Ford was a great story teller.

He got a little carried away, falling into the trap of treating Lincoln like a saint, which is a little surprising given that Ford was no more eager to make the film than Fonda was; there had been successful Broadway plays about Lincoln's youth in recent years, and Ford was only persuaded to make the movie after reading the script by Lamar Trotti, who received an Oscar nomination for Best Story.

Trotti lost to Lewis R. Foster for "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" but won an Oscar five years later for "Wilson."

"Young Mr. Lincoln" received no other Oscar nominations.

Discrimination of a Different Color

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"Now, explain it to me like I'm a 4–year–old."

Denzel Washington

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In what is being described as a crowded pre–Christmas weekend for movies, Tom Hanks (possibly the most bankable male star — certainly one of them — of his generation) and Emma Thompson apparently struggled at the box office with their new movie about Walt Disney and the making of "Mary Poppins."

My guess is that it won't be long before the Hanks name will come to the rescue of "Saving Mr. Banks." It's hard to remember a time when Hanks wasn't a huge box–office draw. He had been nominated for an Oscar (for "Big"), and he had been in some other successful movies ("Sleepless in Seattle," "A League of Their Own") by this time in 1993 (and he had had his share of flops, too) — but the bulk of his Best Actor nominations (and all of his victories) were still in the future.

On this day in 1993, Hanks' future arrived.

Before "Philadelphia" was released 20 years ago today, no big–screen movie had truly dealt with the many and complex issues — social and political as well as medical — surrounding AIDS.

There had been earlier movies about AIDS, but they mostly seemed to focus on the medical mystery that existed regarding the disease and how one might come down with it. "Philadelphia" took on the issues that anyone with a deadly — and mostly misunderstood — disease must face.

From the start, AIDS patients were shunned like polio sufferers once were. Gradually, their suffering was the subject of movies and TV shows, but there was still a great deal of misunderstanding about the disease, how it was spread, all that stuff, and there was virtually no knowledge of the issues that AIDS sufferers faced — in schools, in the workplace, in the community at large.

"Philadelphia" tried to tell the story of one fictional individual afflicted with AIDS who was dismissed from his workplace.

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Joe Miller: The Federal Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibits discrimination against otherwise qualified handicapped persons who are able to perform the duties required by their employment. Although the ruling did not address the specific issue of HIV and AIDS discrimination ...

Andrew Beckett: Subsequent decisions have held that AIDS is protected as a handicap under law, not only because of the physical limitations it imposes, but because the prejudice surrounding AIDS exacts a social death which precedes the actual physical one.

Joe Miller: This is the essence of discrimination: formulating opinions about others not based on their individual merits, but rather on their membership in a group with the same characteristics.

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Andrew Beckett (Hanks) was a young lawyer in Philadelphia who had just been promoted to partner of his prestigious law firm and had been given a case involving the firm's most important client. He was also gay and had contracted AIDS, but he kept both his sexuality and his medical condition secret from his employers.

Within two weeks of his promotion, the file for this case disappeared, then was mysteriously found at the last minute, and Beckett was dismissed, ostensibly for incompetence, but he believed he was fired because someone at the firm had discovered that he had AIDS, and he went about suing the firm for wrongful dismissal.

To represent him in court, he got Joe Miller (Denzel Washington), a personal–injury lawyer and unapologetic homophobe who at first declined to take the case but later agreed to do so for the money and exposure it offered. An interesting and ironic — and, in some ways, predictable — transformation took place. Miller began to realize that the discrimination that Beckett and others like him faced wasn't any different from the racial discrimination that Miller and others like him faced.

Discrimination is discrimination, whether it is based on race, religion, age or anything else.

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Judge Garrett (Charles Napier): In this courtroom, Mr. Miller, justice is blind to matters of race, creed, color, religion and sexual orientation.

Joe Miller: With all due respect, your honor, we don't live in this courtroom, do we?

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There were complaints from the gay community and elsewhere about some aspects of the movie. Some of the complaints focused on a perceived tendency to compromise on some harsh realities in order to appeal to a wider audience.

I'll give you an example of the kind of thing I mean.

I'm not gay, but I have friends who are, and some of them — in fact, many of them — have encountered the most resistance from those from whom support was expected — family and friends.

Hanks' character was fortunate in that he had a large, supportive family — "I didn't raise my kids to sit in the back of the bus," his mother (Joanne Woodward) told him — but many gay people have suffered the sting of the rejection of parents and siblings. Whatever the reason for it, that kind of rejection is painful, and I honestly felt that director Jonathan Demme kinda copped out on that one.

But Demme didn't entirely shy away from showing the pain of isolation brought on by the stigma of AIDS. It was most vividly illustrated when Hanks initially visited Miller, his one–time courtroom adversary, in search of legal representation and left rejected.

That scene was even more poignant when it was combined with Bruce Springsteen's haunting (and, eventually, Oscar–winning) song, "Streets of Philadelphia." I've never been the Springsteen fan that many of my peers are, but I have always admired that song.

Neil Young, another songwriter favored by those of my generation, shared the award with Springsteen.

Hanks received his second Best Actor nomination (and his first Oscar) for his performance in "Philadelphia."

Washington wasn't even recognized with a nomination from the Oscars. He had been nominated three times before — winning Best Supporting Actor for "Glory" — and, as of 2013, he has been nominated for Best Actor four times (winning in 2002 for "Training Day") — but he received no recognition for his work in "Philadelphia."

Neither, for that matter, was Jason Robards recognized for his work. Robards was one of my favorite actors, as is Mary Steenburgen (who played the law firm's legal representative in the suit), but neither was nominated by the Academy.

There were others who made memorable contributions for which I suppose it was a given that they would not be nominated for Oscars.

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Possibly the most memorable was the performance of Ron Vawter as an associate at the firm. His character testified after Hanks' character collapsed in court and was taken to the hospital for what apparently was the last time.

Vawter's character said he didn't know that Hanks' character had AIDS, but he had suspected it. He was asked if he had ever mentioned his suspicions to Hanks. He replied that he had not, that he had not even given Hanks a chance to talk about his condition. "I think I'm going to regret that for as long as I live," he said.

There was irony in his words (even though they weren't his words but words he had been given by the script writer). Vawter was suffering from AIDS and died of a heart attack while flying from Zurich to New York less than four months after the debut of "Philadelphia." He was 45.

When Hollywood Acknowledged Rape

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Sarah Tobias (Jodie Foster): You don't understand how I feel! I'm standing there with my pants down and my crotch hung out for the world to see, and three guys are sticking it to me, a bunch of other guys are yelling and clapping, and you're standing there telling me that that's the best you can do. Well, if that's the best you could do, then your best sucks!

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Thirty years ago, in 1983, the story of a woman who was raped repeatedly by a group of men while others looked on and cheered in a Massachusetts bar made national headlines.

I guess it was around that time that the pendulum on attitudes about rape in this country began to swing in a different direction. Before 1983, the prevailing attitude held that a woman brought such an attack on herself through her behavior and/or what she was wearing. (Actually, that continued to be the prevailing attitude after 1983, too — and, in some places, it remains the prevailing attitude, but not as many.)

It took five years, but the Massachusetts case forced Hollywood to deal with rape in a more direct manner than it ever really had before. Hence, "The Accused" premiered on this day in 1988. It wasn't a literal history of the 1983 case. Rather, it was a fictionalized account — and it was a story that, by 1988, movie audiences were ready to see.

Jodie Foster starred as the victim of a gang rape. The story that emerged was one of a young woman who had argued with her boyfriend, dressed provocatively, took some drugs and danced and flirted in a bar. This was the justification for three men raping her on a pinball machine (in real life, as I recall, it was a pool table).

The attorney who was assigned to the case (Kelly McGillis) wasn't happy about the assignment and wanted to drop it. Eventually, she entered a plea bargain that called for the rapists to serve some jail time for "reckless endangerment" — her thinking was that a defense attorney could use Foster's history against her and wind up getting all the attackers acquitted of a rape charge — but it wasn't enough for Foster's character, who felt cheated of the opportunity to tell her story in court.

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At that point, Foster's character began to really engage in some reckless behavior. She plowed into a pickup truck — turned out the driver was one of the witnesses to the rape, and he propositioned her. She wound up in the hospital because of the collision, but she came out of it determined to bring charges against her rapists and those who had encouraged them.

And she persuaded McGillis' character to pursue justice with her.

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"Mr. Paulsen has told you that the testimony of Sarah Tobias is nothing. Sarah Tobias was raped, but that is nothing. She was cut and bruised and terrorized, but that is nothing. All of it happened in front of a howling crowd, and that is nothing. Well, it may be nothing to Mr. Paulsen, but it is not nothing to Sarah Tobias, and I don't believe it is nothing to you. Next, Mr. Paulsen tried to convince you that Kenneth Joyce was the only one in that room who knew that Sarah Tobias was being raped — the only one!

"Now you watched Kenneth Joyce. How did he strike you? Did he seem especially sensitive, especially observant? Did he seem so remarkable that you said to yourselves, 'Of course! This man would notice things other people wouldn't.' Do you believe that Kenneth Joyce saw something in that room that those three men didn't see?"

Kathryn Murphy (Kelly McGillis)

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So McGillis brought charges of "criminal solicitation" against the witnesses who had cheered and encouraged the assault. It was a clever ploy, reminiscent of cases in the 1960s when murder charges weren't likely to succeed in most Deep South jurisdictions, and the best strategy for federal litigators was to charge participants with civil rights violations.

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Kathryn Murphy: Listen again ... "A person is guilty of criminal solicitation if he commands, induces, entreats or otherwise persuades another person to commit a felony ..."

Paul Rudolph (Carmen Argenziano): You can read it to me until you're blue in the face, I am not gonna let you prosecute a bunch of spectators ...

Kathryn Murphy: They're not spectators. They solicited the rape.

Paul Rudolph: Do you really want to ask a jury to lock up a bunch of people for clapping and cheering?

Kathryn Murphy: Clapping? Cheering? Pushing? Goading? Getting the rape going and keeping it going!

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Nearly two years ago, I wrote about a 1982 movie called "The Seduction," and the marketing of that movie tells you everything you really need to know about attitudes toward sexual assault and stalking roughly six years before "The Accused" hit the theaters.

I don't think anyone was killed in "The Seduction," but stalking was a prominent theme — even though I don't think the term was in use at that time — and implied in it was the threat of violence, even death. It was billed as an "erotic thriller," which is ironic, given that most women who have been stalked would say there was nothing erotic about it.

The same thinking has been applied to rape for generations. Truly awful behavior by men has been enabled by others who said the victim asked for it, or something similar. That attitude clearly influenced the initial treatment of Sarah Tobias' case in "The Accused." She had a checkered past, and the prosecution chose to pursue reckless endangerment instead of sexual assault in large part because of concern that the defense would pick away at her history, resulting, as I say, in acquittals.

Unfortunately, that probably was a realistic treatment of the deals that lawyers made all the time in those days. I covered the police and court beats for awhile, and I saw my share of deals being made. I knew what motivated lawyers then, and I am sure it motivates them now — the desire to win or, at least, to not lose or be perceived as having lost.

I could understand when I covered the police and the courts how ordinary people, unaccustomed to dealing with the legal system, could be confused, angry and frustrated by the routine maneuverings. And Sarah Tobias was frustrated when McGillis struck a deal to make sure the defendants would get some jail time. To McGillis, it was a victory to get something instead of nothing.

But it was obviously more than that to Sarah Tobias. She had been violated multiple times in front of a room full of strangers. She wanted a jury to hear her story, to know what she had suffered and to impose what she believed was an appropriate sentence.

I thought the movie was well done, and Foster won a much–deserved Best Actress Oscar for her performance. More than that, I thought "The Accused" was one of those significant movies that actually has an influence on cultural attitudes.

It made an important contribution to our growth as a nation.

Doing the Dirty Work

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Harper Lee's novel, "To Kill a Mockingbird," is one I would recommend to anyone.

One of my journalism students says he requires his children to read it when they reach a certain age, and I applaud him for that. More parents should encourage their children to read.

But that's another issue entirely.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the debut of the movie version of "To Kill a Mockingbird," and I would recommend it to anyone as well.

But I would recommend reading the book first.

The unavoidable lesson of the story is that there are people in the world who do society's dirty work, and that is something that isn't always appreciated as it should be.

There are those who do the physically dirty work, of course — the ones who have to collect and sort through trash or debris, for example — and the ones who must do the psychologically dirty work — for example, the people who carry out state–mandated executions or whose work requires them to persuade juries to impose such death sentences.

Atticus Finch, the hero of "To Kill a Mockingbird," was such a person, another character observed — a man who was born to do society's dirty work. He was a defense attorney, and he had the most thankless job imaginable in the Depression–era South. He had to defend a black man charged with raping a white woman.

In half a century, the film has been praised repeatedly. The American Film Institute ranks it #25 on AFI's Top 100 movies list — and deservedly so.

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AFI ranked Gregory Peck's Atticus Finch as the top film hero of all time, and that's a tough one to argue with. In both the book and the movie, Atticus was good and honest, the kind of man whose word was his bond, who felt actions spoke louder than words and who never felt inclined to draw attention to his actions.

If one were to choose a character from a book or movie to admire and to emulate, there could be none better than Atticus Finch.

There are many great scenes in "To Kill a Mockingbird," but, if I had to choose one that I simply had to see, it would be the one where Atticus shoots down a rabid dog in the street. From quite a distance. With a single shot.

His son, who was embarrassed because Atticus declined to play football for the Methodists and chafed at Atticus' refusal to let him have a gun, was astonished and it showed.

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"What's the matter, boy?" the sheriff asked him. "Didn't you know your daddy is the best shot in this county?"

Atticus was full of surprises. But, in many ways, he was as transparent as glass. He was the essence of nobility because he was so unself–conscious about it.

Miss Maudie (Rosemary Murphy) saw what Atticus was and tried to explain it to his son at a point in the story where the injustices of the world were painfully clear.

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"Some men in this world are born to do our unpleasant jobs for us," she said. "Your father is one of them."

It may be the most moving line in the movie — because it is so direct.

The book still holds up after half a century. So does the movie — and Gregory Peck's performance.

'12 Angry Men' Still a Compelling Film

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Today, it almost seems like an obvious thing, a cliche of moviemaking.

"12 Angry Men," originally a TV play, made its debut as a movie 55 years ago today. I wasn't around in those days, but I have to think that the basic premise — a solitary member of a criminal jury votes "not guilty" and persuades his fellow jurors to change their votes — wasn't new then.

It probably just hadn't been used as much as a plot device by 1957 as it has in the 55 years since.

If that was so, it must have gotten a fresh spin as a movie.

"12 Angry Men" has been remade a few times since then — and with some pretty big names, too — but I always maintain that the '57 version was the best — if only because of Henry Fonda, who played the lone juror.

Fonda was the perfect actor to cast if a director and/or producer of a movie had a lesson to teach, and Juror #8 (that was all the audience knew to call him — until the very last minute of the movie) had plenty of lessons to share.

But the roles were kind of reversed on this project.

Originally, Reginald Rose wrote the play for TV's Studio One, and the TV production did so well that Sidney Lumet was persuaded to direct a movie adaptation. Rose co–produced the movie along with Fonda — Fonda's only foray into movie production — and the two of them were responsible for bringing Lumet into the project.

The brilliance of the story lies in the way that each juror's true colors were revealed through a series of fairly typical jury discussions (I've served on my share of juries). After I watched "12 Angry Men" the first time (I was visiting my grandmother, as I recall, during the summer between my freshman and sophomore years in college), I felt that I knew the characters of each of those "jurors" better than I knew the characters of some people I had known most of my life.

In our polarized culture, I think there are lessons in "12 Angry Men" that might actually promote civility and tolerance of dissenting opinions.

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"It's always difficult to keep personal prejudice out of a thing like this. And wherever you run into it, prejudice always obscures the truth. I don't really know what the truth is. I don't suppose anybody will ever really know. Nine of us now seem to feel that the defendant is innocent, but we're just gambling on probabilities — we may be wrong. We may be trying to let a guilty man go free, I don't know. Nobody really can. But we have a reasonable doubt, and that's something that's very valuable in our system. No jury can declare a man guilty unless it's sure."

Juror #8

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As great as that piece of dialogue is, it really took someone of Fonda's moral authority to give it meaning.

For modern movie viewers, raised on the slick and the gaudy, the absence of splashy special effects — or even much variety in the setting (nearly the entire movie takes place in the jury room) — may be an obstacle to their enjoyment of the great story.

But anyone who has ever served on a jury will recognize at least some of the personalities of the jurors — the rather timid clerk; an anxious businessman whose thoughts are of his estranged son; a laborer; a sports fan eager to complete his jury obligation so he can attend a baseball game; a thoughtful older (and presumably retired) man; an immigrant; a bigot.

And more, much more.

I've watched it many times since that first time back in my college days, and I find it compelling each time. When it is over, I can't say enough good things about it.