An ambitious lawyer uses circumstantial evidence to help convict an innocent man then tries to make amends with his family.An ambitious lawyer uses circumstantial evidence to help convict an innocent man then tries to make amends with his family.An ambitious lawyer uses circumstantial evidence to help convict an innocent man then tries to make amends with his family.
Don Dillaway
- Paul Wallace
- (as Donald Dillaway)
Oscar Apfel
- Managing Editor
- (uncredited)
Bess Flowers
- Telephone Operator
- (uncredited)
Eddie Foster
- Man Betting with Malone
- (uncredited)
Sherry Hall
- Reporter
- (uncredited)
Eddie Kane
- Abe Steiner
- (uncredited)
Pat O'Malley
- Dr. Strong
- (uncredited)
Lee Phelps
- Radio Test Man
- (uncredited)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaEdmund Lowe, looking out the window at an outside corridor of the court building, says he is looking at "the Bridge of Sighs," and says that he sent many men across it with "a one-way ticket to the Big House." The reference is to the Doge's Palace in Venice, where trials were held, and which was separated from the cells by such a corridor. In "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage," Byron says, "I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs,/A palace and a prison on each hand."
- GoofsEdmund Lowe's secretary has been in the job at least ten years, since Lowe was District Attorney, and says she is under 30. (When the film was made, she was 22, and looks it.) She therefore would not have been old enough to be secretary to the District Attorney ten years before.
- Quotes
Val Lorraine: Anyway, it'd ruin my chances to marry the man from Dubuque.
Burton: Grand Rapids.
Featured review
Good, But Should Be Better
There's a great script here, fine players and some dynamite camera work by Ted Tetzlaff in this story about District Attorney Edmund Lowe. He sends the wrong man to the electric chair, quits to go into defense work and make amends, and winds up on trial for the murder of Evelyn Brent. However, there is something severely lacking that stops this script from Jo Swerling, who did great scripts for great directors like Capra and Hitchcock, from being great. Perhaps it's the way that every time you expect things to burst loose, the shot changes from a pacing moving camera into a tight two-shot. Perhaps it's the lack of overt action -- although given that Swerling wrote the screenplay for Hitchcock's claustrophobic LIFEBOAT, that answer doesn't feel right. Maybe it's the way that everyone wears their clothes, as if they've just come from a fresh pressing at the tailor shop.
Whatever is wrong with this movie, it winds up being too talky. Given that the director is Irving Cummings, who started directing in 1921, and that stars Lowe and Evelyn Brent were seasoned silent performers, it should work brilliantly, But it just works very well instead. Ah, well.
Whatever is wrong with this movie, it winds up being too talky. Given that the director is Irving Cummings, who started directing in 1921, and that stars Lowe and Evelyn Brent were seasoned silent performers, it should work brilliantly, But it just works very well instead. Ah, well.
helpful•39
- boblipton
- Jul 10, 2009
Details
- Runtime1 hour 10 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
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Top Gap
By what name was Attorney for the Defense (1932) officially released in Canada in English?
Answer