Jugez-moi coupable

I went to a preview screening of this film, so the version I saw may not make it onto the screen. I was pretty hesitant when I heard that Mr. Diesel was in it. I have to report that he did justice to the role. OK, he was no young Al Pacino, but he was certainly better than the old Al Pacino would be in the role. And Pacino has to be the patron saint of the film. His performance could have been loud, it could have been slick, instead he adds surprising depth to an essentially obnoxious character.

The story isn't surprising, but it does carry a bit of a cultural wallop, and Deisel, using dialog drawn from actual courtroom testimony is able to convey a real sense of outrage over being societal discrimination. It is a testimony to Lumet's direction, that the film never veers into the didactic or preachy.

The real surprise to me was Annabella Sciorra. The print I saw had no credits, so I wasn't expecting her and it took me a bit to place her face. She was electrifying. She truly lit up the screen in her 5 minutes. In an extended dialog with Diesel as her husband, she goes from dispassion, to jealousy, to outrage, to sexual hunger in the most nuanced and natural performance I have seen in a long while. Sciorra is a major talent and needs to get some larger roles, maybe even a few where she isn't the Wife/Fiancée of a N.J. mobster.

The movie had a really great script; it was funny, dramatic and touching. I was really surprised by Vin Diesel's performance, I wasn't expecting him to pull it off. I think Jackie D himself, his personality and his words helped Vin a lot there. I was also impressed by Raúl Esparza as Tony. I've seen him on Broadway and I have been wowed by his stage performances. I wasn't sure if he could make the transition, but he was the perfect paranoid junkie. The only problems I had with the movie are with tiny details like extras dressed in 2006 fashions and flat screen monitors on desks. Knowing that the trial began in the early 90's, it caught my attention and stuff like the computer monitors shouldn't grab attention. Overall, "Find Me Guilty" is a great movie, and I highly recommend it.

I have never particularly cared one way or the other about Vin Diesel as an actor. I never loved nor hated him and his work. However, after seeing "Find Me Guilty" I found myself really respecting him and his craft. He and this film were very compelling.

The story is about the life and trial of Jackie DiNorscio, a lower level mobster who was prosecuted along with a huge group of other co-conspirators in what turned out to be the longest trial in US history...nearly two years long!! And, during he course of this trial based on the RICO statute, each defendant ended up having their own lawyers...except for DiNorscio...who, insanely, decided to defend himself! What?! Some seemingly dim New Jersey mobster defending himself?!

The film amazed me because although I don't like mobster films at all, I was mesmerized by the story...mostly because it's supposedly true. And, oddly, Diesel made you almost like the guy...almost. His performance was very compelling...and well worth seeing.

By the way, if you are concerned about adult content, there is a lot of very harsh language but not much else. Very little violence, no nudity and only a bit that might make parents feel uncomfortable about letting their kids or mother watch the movie. Interesting from start to finish and never dull.

I'm sure most of the comments about this movie will center around Diesel's amazing performance, but I'd like to focus on the overall quality of this film. From the time the movie gets to the courtroom, the true beauty of this film shines. Every character from the judge to the prosecutors were all well casted and their roles well defined and executed.

My one concern is why is it I always leave movies with organized crime themes rooting for or embracing the criminals. Their life style certainly is not most people would wish to emulate but yet most films which portray them don't manage to tap into the conscious citizen in all of us, somehow the writers and producers undermine your sense of right and wrong and render you powerless to pass negative judgement on the criminal.

With that aside, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and welcome feedback on my commetns regarding my rant.

It's amazing to see certain actors working with a director like the veteran Sidney Lumet (if it's appropriate to use for him who knows, though this is his latest film, at 81, over a near 50 year career), and see really intriguing, special things happening on screen. Actors like Pacino, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger, and Peter Finch among many others undoubtedly have other noteworthy performances in other films, but in the work they've done with Lumet there's something that connects just right, to get that full touch reaching into the character and pulling out the humanity, or lack thereof. Vin Diesel, in this case, has possibly his most convincing and on-spot performance to date and, with the exception of his supporting role in Boiler Room, goes beyond the typically macho-roles of his career in the past several years. He is a tough guy in this, true, and Jackie DiNorscio has the life of a criminal to him. But in the story presented in the film, of this man defending himself in the longest trial in American history, it's essential that the actor playing him gets it right with the emotional connections of the character, of being truthful. Diesel gets that right, in a performance that has that gangster quality (err, 'gagster' as DiNorsci refers himself as), but is also has a certain fascinating complexity that the character of, for example, the prosecuting attorney, could never have.

Still, Lumet captures this ensemble with enough nuance and well-spun, real dialog, for two movies. It's not at all strange to see him doing a courtroom drama, as it reaches back to his first film 12 Angry Men. This time however there is a difference in the focus on a story lasting three years, and the evidence in the sprawling, elephantine case against the crime families is not as crucial for getting involved in the film as the people who make up the case and courtroom. There are at least a few character actors providing some terrific work, like Ron Silver as the judge, or Peter Dinklage as one of the defense attorneys. And while amid a scene or shot here and there that could've been lost or put on the cutting room floor (it's hard to pinpoint which after a first viewing without notes), there are at least a few that do provide some extra interest that most other filmmakers would've lost. The detail of the one mobster who becomes ill and has to come in every day to court on a stretcher is one thing. Or the detail of the importance of a chair in Jackie's prison cell.

And in this mix there are a few scenes that rank up with being some of the more dramatically perfect scenes Lumet has done, chiefly by letting the actors- who have inhabited the roles to the point of doubtless believability- just do their work. Two that come to mind are when the judge informs Jackie about the death of his mother, and how what Diesel doesn't show to the audience is even more important than what is (I'm reminded of the scene towards the end of Serpico where he gets the badge). Another is when Jackie is questioning his cousin on the stand. The filming of this scene isn't all that complex, but the dynamic between the two characters is, and the right notes are just there between the two actors. By the end of Find Me Guilty, I didn't think I saw an outright masterpiece like some of the director's other films. Neverhtheless, I also knew that I had seen an extremely confident and very good piece of work that brings out what's dependable in Lumet and what's unexpected in an actor like Diesel. Not to mention that, here and there, the film is quite funny. 8.5/10