12 Angry Men is a 1957 American drama film. This film is about 12 jurors debating in a very hot and uncomfortable room about an 18 yr old boy who has been accused of stabbing and killing his father. Juror #8 the assumed “protagonist” test the well know police statement, “Innocent until proven guilty.” As they deliberate for hours, different jurors’ characteristics start to appear and begin to bump heads. In this paper, the plot, characters, ideas/thoughts/themes, language/dialog, music and spectacle will be described. The characters in this film were very diverse and were from so many different walks of life.
12 Angry Men Topic (Groupthink) that helps an individual understands the movie, 12 Angry Men. “12 Angry Men”, is a movie about 12 jurors who get stuck in a room to debate if a person charged of murder is guilty or not guilty. The case seemed to look like a one sided case, but little did they know one guy would vote differently. The 11 men actually lost to one man, and it caused emotions from the beginning to the end of the movie. This movie was all about non-ethical and lazy like sayings, such as: “lets get it over quick” and “who really cares”.
12 Angry Men Response The 1957 film, “12 Angry Men,” directed by Sidney Lumet tells the story of twelve jurors who are chosen to sit in on an eighteen year old boy’s trial. These men must decide whether or not the boy is guilty or not of stabbing his father in the chest and killing him. They have the boy’s life in their hands and need to come up with a verdict of either to send him to the chair or let him free. Throughout the movie they take various votes, the first one had the count of 11-1 with guilty being the dominant choice. Juror 8, played by Henry Fonda, was an architect named Davis and the only one to vote towards not guilty.
Davis the name of number 8 juror tried to convince the members of the jury and he succeed to change their minds. Davis was smart and logically man, he started doubt the evidence by the switch knife. The jurors believed the knife belongs to the eighteen years old guy and he stabbed it in his father chest, Davis made his argument by said might the murder used another knife looked like the guy’s knife and he showed the jurors a knife looked like the knife was used to kill the man. After this argument the one of jurors #9 changed his vote to not guilty. After that #5 juror who had a problem to express his opinion, he changed his mind and vote for not guilty.
However, as the movie progresses, a few inner problems come into light. For example, Will sees a boy who bullies him in kindergarten, so he and his friends jump the guy. Watching the fight, one can see that there is a lot of bottle up emotions inside of Will, and he really resents this person from his childhood. When the police catch up to him, the viewer finds out that this is not the first time Will has been in trouble with the law; he is a felon who uses his good people skills and public speaking to get out of jail time. Even later on in the movie, we also see that Will is a chain smoker, violent, and has extreme trust issues.
Sidney Lumet’s first film, 12 Angry Men, is a single-room film about jury-disputing. If 12 jurors fail to find reasonable doubt, an eighteen-year-old boy will sentence to death due to the charge of being the murderer of his father. In the first vote, 11 think the boy is guilty; the one left simply thinks it is too soon to make this decision. The other men get choleric and present the evidence to persuade him. The speech not only shows their thoughts but their attitudes and prejudices.
From her story to the scar nothing matches up to what she is saying, but because he had an all white jury, they found him guilty. “As you grow older, you’ll see white men cheat black men every day, but let me tell you something and don’t forget it-whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich of a family he comes from, or how fine of a family he comes from, that white man is trash.”(Lee 223) “Why reasonable people go stark raving mad when anything involving a Negro comes up, is something I don’t pretend to understand.”(Lee 100) In current events, Schools are tarnished by 5,000 racist incidents. “Experts say racism in schools reflects what children are hearing in their homes and communities.”(Pg. 1 Paragraph 3) These
While in the jury room a vote was conducted to determine what people thought of the boy –guilty or not guilty. It turned out that out of twelve people only one (the architect) thought the boy was not guilty. Inductive reasoning seems to have been the basis of their decisions as many evidences rose. One of the evidence presented is where an old man living down stairs claimed to have heard the boy shouting ‘I will kill you.’ it was also after these words that he heard a thud which forced him to rush to the stairway. The man also insists that he saw the boy running downstairs after the commotion.
12 Angry Men persuaded by rhetoric In the movie 12 angry men rhetoric is found throughout the movies as the jurors argue amongst one another as to whether or not a teenage boy is guilty of stabbing his father. As they dig deeper into the case and examine evidence closer the jurors use all three forms of rhetoric, ethos, pathos, and logo’s in order to decide the boys fait. When the jurors first take a preliminary vote it is found that juror number 8 is the only one who votes not guilty. When questioned by the other 11, he reveals to them that he couldn’t possibly vote guilty without first discussing the case, because the guilty verdict would mean the death of teenage boy. This is a great example of the use of the rhetoric, ethos’s because he is basing his decision of not guilty, off of principles and morals rather than evidence shown, and wants to first discuss and way all the evidence of the case, rather than just making a quick decision because it seems that the logical answer would be guilty.
The film “12 Angry Men” (1957) is based on the story of twelve jurors who are responsible for deliberating and deciding the fate of a teenage boy accused of murdering his father. Although to most it seems like an open and shut case where the boy is definitely guilty, one juror speaks out against the popular groupthink of the other eleven jurors and admits that although he does not know if the boy is guilty, he is not convinced that he is. Throughout the film this one juror, played by Henry Fonda, speaks his mind in a very non-confrontational way, and begins to sway the jury vote by vote. By the end of the film the jury has reached a consensus of “not guilty”. Power is described in our text as “the ability to influence, command, or apply force; a measure of a person’s potential to get other to do what he or she wants them to do, as well as to avoid being forced by others to do what he or she does not want to do”.