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
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