The Dock Brief

This neglected little film is based on a one-act play by John Mortimer, the creator of "Rumpole of the Bailey," and it extends some scenes (particularly the flashbacks to the lives of both the barrister and the accused) in ways that add little but running time. Beryl Reid, a very distinguished British stage actress, is given a role that requires her to do almost nothing but laugh hysterically. Oddly enough, the expansion of the script makes it feel even more theatrical than cinematic.

The real reasons to see this "Trial and Error" (aka "The Dock Brief") are the performances of Peter Sellers and Richard Attenborough. The latter was one of England's great character actors before he became a director and a Lord. Here, hidden behind a putty nose, he delivers an impeccable performance as a mediocre little man who kills his wife for a bit of quiet. And this was the period - just before head-turning international fame struck - when Sellers was offering one miraculous performance after another. His barrister is a subtle blend of self-delusional bluster and frightened awareness of his own inadequacy; the delicacy of this performance, especially the love he seems to feel for this little man who might prove his salvation, is a joy to behold. And the very last shot of the film, just before the final credits, made me laugh out loud - very silly, yet absolutely right.

Mr. Morganhall (Peter Sellers) is excited, as he became a barrister decades ago and has just sat in his office ever since....never getting to try a single case in court. To put it bluntly, he's not especially bright or a good lawyer...and now he's hoping a murder case he's been assigned to might open up the door for more trials. The problem is that his client, while a nice guy in many ways, DID murder his wife and freely admits it. He also, reluctantly, admits that the only reason he picked Morganhall was that he chose him at random! Does the defendant stand a chance with this boob of a lawyer?

This film is not a laugh out loud comedy and is quite subtle. The story also isn't super important, believe it or not. It's more a chance to watch the very talented Sellers show off his skills as an actor...and he's lovely in the lead. Richard Attenborough is also very nice as the killer...and the film is enjoyable and an unusual departure for them both. Well worth seeing....and I really loved seeing the clever way the director did those flashback scenes.

John Mortimer was a very clever witty man. His writings were accessible, never laboured, they never patronised the audience, baffled them or bored them. As a former barrister, he was entirely used to addressing and winning-over juries. It was plausible at the very least that his writings were based on true experiences. Like Dickens, working in the field of Law exposed him to a gallery of characters and odd situations which were beyond most people's experiences.

And in the radio play version, the story starts with the curious but plausible situation where an imprisoned accused (of murdering his wife) is joined in his cell by the barrister who is to defend him. The dialogue is both entirely reasonable yet at the same time entirely plausible such that the accused wrongly assumes that the barrister is a another accused come to share the cell. A long conversation at entire cross-purposes ensues. The skill and wit is all in the carefully constructed dialogue.

Here in this film version, the simplicity and wit is replaced by superfluous dialogue and additional scenes. Richard Attenborough is excellent as the accused, a modest man with a great deal to be modest about. Peter Sellers is however lack-lustre, perhaps ill at ease with the part and perhaps the direction. Sellers was at base a comedian who became a comic actor. Perhaps in 1962 he had not yet developed the skill to deliver a part he could not empathise with.

I see that it received no awards of any kind - confirmation that it fell flat

With respect, I must disagree with the other reviewers. I generally relish the old British films, especially the comedies (The Ladykillers, Kind Hearts and Coronets, The Green Man et al.) however I found this film to be well acted, but not particularly funny, and rather tedious. Attenborough and Sellers do show their considerable versatility and skills. But Mortimer's story makes one long for a good "Rumpole" episode. I kept waiting for the story to get going, but it never did. The pacing is s-l-o-w, which isn't inherently bad (see my review of The Smallest Show on Earth) but what does the film add up to? For me, it is an interesting curio perhaps, but not something one can really recommend.

Peter Sellers is a lawyer who has waited years for his first case. He gets it in the form of Richard Attenborough, who admits that he killed his wife, Beryl Reid because she wouldn't run away with the boarder. In Attenborough's cell, they brainstorm trial strategies in fantasy. Then they go up to the actual trial.

It's an absolute trifle of a movie, little more than a two-man show about the inanity of the law. That's hardly surprising, given that it's derived from a play by John Mortimer, best remembered for his many judicial mysteries, and the TV series RUMPOLE OF THE BAILEY, based on them. Sellers and Attenborough attempt to evoke the sort of movie that might have been made were Laurel & Hardy to make one, although one without anything in the way of physical slapstick.