Lumet seems to have returned to the theme he tackled in "Twelve Angry Men" -- one stand-up guy who is disparaged in court by the others on his team until, in the end, he enters his house justified.
Vin Diesel is the star and he does a surprisingly good job, mixing vernacular English with the savvy of a street rat. He's like the inarticulate bumbler in a classroom who manages to come up with the highest grade on the exam. But then the rest of the cast is excellent too. Peter Delage is especially impressive and it's good to see a totally gray Alex Rocco as the Capo. Ron Silver, as the stern judge, plays to his strengths.
The script sticks to the courtroom and the jail house where Diesel is incarcerated for a looong time. A dozen or so racketeers are charged under RICO and brought together for a huge trial lasting more than a year. All of the defendants have lawyers except for Diesel, as Jackie DeNorsia, who decides to defend himself (he's spent half his life in jail). He tells the court that he's known the other defendants all his life and they are his family. But if they're his family, they treat him like the family idiot when he puts on his lawyer hat. His presentational style is engaging. He's full of jokes, some of them obscene. And he doesn't mind playing the wounded victim either. The others, however, are not sure whether he's helping them or damaging his case with his clumsy, low-brow stand-up comedy act.
Still, Jackie sticks to his guns, even when he's shunned by the others. He will not rat on them, though they may have been responsible for Jackie's being shot several times. And in the end, they salute him as they leave the courtroom -- free at last. Jackie, laden with more chains than King Kong, beams at them as they wave and blow kisses, though he's returning to the slams and there is nothing much to lead us to believe that once Jackie is out of sight, he will not also be out of mind. If this is victory, someone will have to explain the meaning of the word "victory." In fact, I've begun wondering what "victory" is supposed to mean for the past year or two.
This is a strange plot. We don't know what the horde of defendants are charged with. They wore pinkie rings, ate in Italian restaurants, and passed each other greasy paper bags filled with money. So what? Lumet and his writers aren't interested in the court case. They're interested in Jackie and how he responds to the pressure from both sides. If he cooperates and rats, he's out of jail. If he doesn't -- well.
In the end I didn't care much for the hero of the play. Jackie's shown as a proud and sometimes loving human being. The corrections officers clobber him and when asked about it by the judge, he replies, "I fell." He has a mother who dies halfway through the movie. The problem is that he doesn't deserve much in the way of compassion because in fact he shows so little for others. Diesel is such a huge and awkward presence that we sense from the various hints that he can be, and has been, one mean mother in the past. And his "regular guy" act may have impressed the jury but struck me as not-quite-expert manipulation, akin to Willie Stark's "I'm a hick, just like you," in "All the King's Men." "I'm so stupid that I can hardly walk, so you believe me, okay?" Not okay with me. I was glad when Marlon Brando turned on the gang in "On the Waterfront." I don't know if these particular goons committed crimes or just were guilty of wearing pinkie rings, but if they did half of what the prosecutor accuses them of, Jackie should have dropped the dime. In the last few years I've wondered not just about the meaning of the word "victory" but about whether loyalty is the greatest of all virtues. Maybe it's better to follow the law. Generally speaking.
Vin Diesel is the star and he does a surprisingly good job, mixing vernacular English with the savvy of a street rat. He's like the inarticulate bumbler in a classroom who manages to come up with the highest grade on the exam. But then the rest of the cast is excellent too. Peter Delage is especially impressive and it's good to see a totally gray Alex Rocco as the Capo. Ron Silver, as the stern judge, plays to his strengths.
The script sticks to the courtroom and the jail house where Diesel is incarcerated for a looong time. A dozen or so racketeers are charged under RICO and brought together for a huge trial lasting more than a year. All of the defendants have lawyers except for Diesel, as Jackie DeNorsia, who decides to defend himself (he's spent half his life in jail). He tells the court that he's known the other defendants all his life and they are his family. But if they're his family, they treat him like the family idiot when he puts on his lawyer hat. His presentational style is engaging. He's full of jokes, some of them obscene. And he doesn't mind playing the wounded victim either. The others, however, are not sure whether he's helping them or damaging his case with his clumsy, low-brow stand-up comedy act.
Still, Jackie sticks to his guns, even when he's shunned by the others. He will not rat on them, though they may have been responsible for Jackie's being shot several times. And in the end, they salute him as they leave the courtroom -- free at last. Jackie, laden with more chains than King Kong, beams at them as they wave and blow kisses, though he's returning to the slams and there is nothing much to lead us to believe that once Jackie is out of sight, he will not also be out of mind. If this is victory, someone will have to explain the meaning of the word "victory." In fact, I've begun wondering what "victory" is supposed to mean for the past year or two.
This is a strange plot. We don't know what the horde of defendants are charged with. They wore pinkie rings, ate in Italian restaurants, and passed each other greasy paper bags filled with money. So what? Lumet and his writers aren't interested in the court case. They're interested in Jackie and how he responds to the pressure from both sides. If he cooperates and rats, he's out of jail. If he doesn't -- well.
In the end I didn't care much for the hero of the play. Jackie's shown as a proud and sometimes loving human being. The corrections officers clobber him and when asked about it by the judge, he replies, "I fell." He has a mother who dies halfway through the movie. The problem is that he doesn't deserve much in the way of compassion because in fact he shows so little for others. Diesel is such a huge and awkward presence that we sense from the various hints that he can be, and has been, one mean mother in the past. And his "regular guy" act may have impressed the jury but struck me as not-quite-expert manipulation, akin to Willie Stark's "I'm a hick, just like you," in "All the King's Men." "I'm so stupid that I can hardly walk, so you believe me, okay?" Not okay with me. I was glad when Marlon Brando turned on the gang in "On the Waterfront." I don't know if these particular goons committed crimes or just were guilty of wearing pinkie rings, but if they did half of what the prosecutor accuses them of, Jackie should have dropped the dime. In the last few years I've wondered not just about the meaning of the word "victory" but about whether loyalty is the greatest of all virtues. Maybe it's better to follow the law. Generally speaking.