Judge Dennis Davis
Film: The Verdict
Judge Dennis Davis - Film: The Verdict
- Good afternoon or evening to everybody. Today I want to talk to you, in a series that I have been doing over time about various films relating to law. And before I actually start to talk about “The Verdict”, which was made in 1982, let me just give the sort of basic theme that I thought might well be interesting. The theme of this film overall is of course the question of redemption. And in many ways, law is about redemption, or at least an attempt at redemption, the whole idea being that in a case, the notion of whether a party who has suffered injustice may at least in part have their lives redeemed, their interests redeemed. And I suppose in some ways it’s not a totally inappropriate topic to think about, for those of us who are about to enter the Jewish High Holidays. But of course in addition to that, the notion of redemption within law takes place through the confines of a courtroom, and the various procedures which follow therefrom. In this film, of course to some considerable extent, that process of redemption focuses less on the client, although there’s no question that that is partly there, and very much more on the lawyer himself, a lawyer played by Paul Newman. And I will in a couple of minutes play you a clip from the director of the film, Sidney Lumet, to try to give you some indication of how he sees this focus on redemption in relation to the lawyer. But before I do that, let me just tell you a little bit about the various dramatis personae. The film, of course director, is as I’ve already indicated, Sidney Lumet. We’ve come across him before in Lockdown University, because I have already shown some while back, I can’t remember when, the “12 Angry Men”, which he made some 25 years earlier than “The Verdict”. Of course, he was also famous for “Dog Day Afternoon”, “Network”, and that’s a particularly interesting film for me.
It’s I think the last film that was made by Peter Finch, and there’s a wonderful, a line in there. Those of you who remember the film, and I did not, so my dogs don’t seem to appreciate my talk to you, as much as hopefully you are. And Peter Finch’s part in “Network” of 1976, you may remember he was a sort of down-and-out television presenter, finally his last show. And he sort of tells everybody that they should open their windows and shout out that, you know, “We’ve had enough, we can’t take it anymore,” and basically protest. And I thought about that particularly, if you don’t mind me introducing a South African moment, when the tragedy of the fire in Johannesburg took place this week, the notion of almost the Peter Finch act of saying to people, “We should be opening our windows and saying we’re not prepared to take it anymore.” It’s a wonderful protest film. And then of course there’s another film which Lumet did, which has come up in discussion previously in Lockdown, which is “Pawn Broker”, with the wonderful presentation in that case by Rod Steiger. So Lumet is well known in a sense for looking at institutional problems, in this particular case, the legal system. And if I may just say, this is what he himself said about film, “While the goal of all movies is to entertain, the kind of film I believe must go one step further, it must compel the spectator to examine his own conscience, and then stimulate thought and set the mental juices flowing.” And I would hope, even though it’s very difficult to do this in the confines of a Zoom presentation, I would hope that this particular film, if you watch it to its full, or even the discussion that I’m going to have with you about it, will in fact stimulate the mental juices. The ideal of course would be that we would actually have a little introduction, watch the film together, and then discuss it later.
Of course I can’t do that, but we will in a sense, try to give you as many clips to give you an idea of the film as possible. One other person, or two other people who deserve mention of course, is David Mamet, who was the playwright who took a novel, which as you’ll realise in a moment coming from Lumet, was hardly a great novel, and turned it into something really quite dramatic. You may recall that David Mamet is a very well-known playwright, was of course the playwright for “Glenngarry Glen Ross”, a very, very famous text, and also the interesting text in 1992 of “Oleanna” which has come back in various forms, particularly as a result of the Me Too movement, and the focus on sexual harassment. It’s been played over and over in various parts of the world. The third person that I need to mention, of course is Paul Newman himself. Paul Newman was 57 years old at the time that he did this. You’ll notice however that there’s a sense of ageing for all sorts of reasons I’ll come to in a moment. And he was nominated for the Oscar for this. He didn’t get it. He only, he was nominated five times actually for the Oscar, got it once in 1987 for “The Colour of Money”. But in many ways some people would say that this was perhaps his greatest role, and in many ways it might well be. So let me just tell you a little bit about the script, and then let us start discussing it in more detail. The film focuses on the cause of a medical malpractice lawsuit. It’s brought on behalf of a comatose woman whose life has clearly been destroyed when she was improperly given a general anaesthetic during childbirth in a church-owned hospital.
The bishop of the church retains a very wealthy defence attorney, who in this particular case is very well acted by James Mason, and who does not hesitate to intimidate the working class plaintiff, spies on the plaintiff’s lawyer and bribes witnesses, we’ll get back to that. The plaintiff’s attorney is of course Frank Galvin, played by Newman, who has had problems over the years, a lost job, a messy divorce, he was disbarred from practise, and they’re all traceable to his alcoholism. He has a clear drinking problem as an attorney, and it is mentioned over and over again. And in a sense he only makes guest appearances at his office, spends the rest of his day playing pinball and drinking beer, and his evening drinking yet again. He has a friend played by Jack Warden called Mickey Morrissey, who finally decides to get some work for him, desperate attempt to help this down-and-out, once talented, but now alcoholic lawyer, and basically gets him to represent the family of this woman who is comatose as a result of medical malpractice, and has to essentially therefore represent her against the Catholic hospital in Boston. And the interesting part about this, as we shall see, is that, and in the first stage, there is a clear indication that the church is prepared to settle for just over $200,000 out of court. Galvin would get a third of that, in terms of the general practise, and of course that would be enough for him to drink himself probably into his death. But all of a sudden he makes the mistake in a way of going to see the young woman in the hospital. She’s alive but in a coma, and something happens to him there. And he now is determined to try the case, and to prove that the doctors who took her mind away were in fact guilty of incompetence, they were dishonest. And in a sense, that’s what the case is, this is what the trial’s about.
So it combines all of these extraordinarily interesting components, namely the alcoholic lawyer seeking redemption, seeking redemption as well for the family of this woman who has been the subject of medical malpractice, in addition to which, of course we have on the other side, the fancy defence attorney with a large law firm, massive resources, against the alcoholic attorney and a relatively impecunious client. We have the, we see, and I’ll indicate a little bit more about this, the manner in which they don’t just practise law, but essentially spy on the lawyer, on the Frank Galvin, the Newman character, are more than prepared to ensure that certain witnesses disappear, et cetera. You may want to think about this in relation to various trials that are about to engulf the United States of America, but I won’t necessarily go there. Let’s us start then, with just listening to what Sidney Lumet himself said about this film, and Karina, if we can see the first clip.
“The Verdict” is an adaptation of a novel, which I didn’t particularly like. In fact I never read the novel, until after I’d committed to do the movie on the basis of David Mamet’s script. And if I read the novel first, I might not have done it. I don’t know how David drew that story from that book. It’s really David’s creation in every way. And what he chose to do was to make it a story about salvation. It’s more about the personal salvation of the Paul Newman character than it is about the case itself. The case only serves as the instrument by which a man saves himself. And I don’t know how David created that, other than the fact that he’s one of our best writers, but he, for me, none of that came from the book. It’s totally David’s creation. Self-investigation, self-doubt, self-questioning, self-exploration, that is really unique. I don’t remember another courtroom movie in which a character was able to plumb the depths of his own soul to the degree that David accomplished in the screenplay of “The Verdict”. The case in itself is touching, fairly typical. He was very unafraid because at least as far as creating his antagonist was, his antagonist was the Church of Boston, which was no small antagonist to take on.
That’s what Lumet had to say, that effectively it was about the redemption of a down-and-out attorney. And in some ways, as I say, I think that’s absolutely, obviously he’s the director, that’s the writer, which makes it riveting. But let’s now start probing the film a little bit more carefully. At the beginning, as I indicated, the Church wants this case to go away, it doesn’t want to try it, and it basically exploits the vulnerability of the lawyer Newman in order to offer a settlement. And this clip is a clip of an engagement that Newman has with the representatives of the Catholic Church in Boston when the offer is made. So if we can have this clip now, Karina.
And no one will know the truth.
[Church Representative] What is the truth?
That that poor girl put her trust into the, at the hands of two men who took her life. She’s in a coma, her life is gone. She has no home, no family, she’s tied to a machine. She has no friends. And the people who should care for her are doctors, and you and me. I’ve been bought off to look the other way, or we’ve been paid to look the other way. I came here to take your money. I brought snapshots to show you so I could get your money. I can’t do it, I can’t take it, ‘cause if I take the money I’m lost. I’ll just be a rich ambulance chaser. I can’t do it, I can’t take it.
[Church Representative] You may discuss money, Mr. Galvin. How’s your law practise?
Not too good. I only got the one client.
Hey, we can just cut it there. So this is the beginning. He’s offered $210,000 on behalf of the client. I mean, it’s a marvellous sort of clip representing, I think, Newman’s really consummate acting. The pathetic nature of a lawyer who says, “I only have one client, and I probably should take the money but I can’t, because I’ve gone to see my client, and there’s something about her that troubles my conscience to such an extent, I’ve got to take the case,” and this sort of is the trigger for the entire film. The film ultimately represents the range of obstacles, including his alcoholism, which he has to transcend in order to obtain justice for his client. And of course, the film also indicates to a large degree the way lawyers go beyond justice for reasons, sorry, beyond the law in order, as it were, to attain verdicts for their client, in particular in this case, the defence counsel. So then there’s this curious scene, which I’m going to play for you now, in which Newman meets a character played by Charlotte Rampling. We don’t know what her position is at this point in the film. All we know is that they’re about to have an affair. What we learn later is that she’s a lawyer hired by the defence team to spy on the Newman character. But in a way, the little clip that I’m about to play you now plays again into the vulnerability of the character of Paul Newman, of this Galvin character, and in a sense just exacerbates his own desperation and the pathos, in a way the way Lumet is effectively building up to the theme that he wishes to explicate upon, which is the concept of redemption. Of course I forgot to tell you, which I should have, that of course, Sidney Lumet is Jewish. Not only is he Jewish, his parents were actually veterans of the Yiddish theatre, and he himself as a child played within the Yiddish Theatre, just out of interest. So let’s now look at the next clip, which is the Charlotte Rampling clip, where we don’t know why she is having this discussion with a Newman, neither does he, which of course is the cleverness of the director.
What’s your name?
Laura.
Mine’s Frank. Furthermore, you came back to see me tonight.
What if it wasn’t you I came back here to see tonight?
Well, you got lucky. Have you eaten yet?
Mm-mm.
Come on, my God, you are some beautiful woman. The weak. The weak have got to have somebody to fight for. Ain’t that the truth? Want another drink?
Yeah.
Jimmy.
Yeah.
See that’s why the court exists. The court doesn’t exist to give him justice. The court exists to give him a chance at justice.
Are they going to get it?
They might, they might. See, the jury wants to believe, I mean the jury wants to believe. It is something to see. I got to go down there tomorrow and pick out 12 of 'em. All of 'em, all of their lives saying, “It’s a sham, it’s rigged, you can’t fight City Hall.” But when they step into that jury box, I mean, you can just barely see it in their eyes, “Maybe, maybe.”
Maybe what?
Maybe I can do something right.
And?
So then Rampling of course turns out to be a lawyer hired by the defence, and essentially she spies, and there’s a sort of dramatic subplot in relation to that in the film as well. But the critical point here is Newman talking about, you know, the problems of a court, and the hope that people place in the jury, which of course is a theme that Sidney Lumet made famous in “12 Angry Men”, the classic film which we’ve discussed before, about the juries, and how juries actually do in many ways come to the right verdict. But of course we know at the same time that there’s another component in any case, which is your duty to your client. And of course what is particularly interesting in this film, and indeed provocatively so, is that Newman has turned down an offer of settlement without consulting client. The client in this case, of course is the sister of the comatose woman, and her husband. And quite obviously therefore there’s an encounter, a vigorous encounter with the client when the client is informed, obviously not by Newman, but by people within the defence team, that he turned down an offer of $210,000, and has pursued the case in circumstances, when if you are watching the film at this stage, the trial ain’t going very well for Newman. So let’s just look at this confrontation between the client and the lawyer, which is essentially something which is very central to the whole process of the legal system, the extent to which lawyers act autonomously from their clients, or attempt to present the fact that they make excuses for their behaviour, rather than some sort of independent attempt to represent the court, of which they are officers. Just let’s have a look at quite rightly, the way the client is particularly irritated by the behaviour, more than irritated, angered by Newman’s turning down of $210,000, a huge amount of money for a relatively impecunious client.
Who do you think you are, huh? They tell me I can have you disbarred. I am going to have your ticket, do you know what you did? I said to you, you know what you did?
Hey easy, easy. Take it easy now.
It’s okay, it’s okay.
You ruined my life, Mister, me and my wife, and now I’m going to ruin yours. You don’t have to go out there to see that girl. We’ve been going for four years now. See four years, my wife has been crying herself to sleep. What they did to her sister.
Look I swear to you, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t turn down the offer if I thought I couldn’t win the case.
What do you mean, what you thought? I am a working man, and I am trying to get my wife out of town. Now we hired you, and I am paying you, and I got to find out from the other side that they offered $200,000?
I’m going to win this. I’m going to the jury with a solid case. I got a, I got a famous doctor for an expert witness. You’re going to get, what? Five, six times what you.
You guys, you guys are all the same. The doctors at the hospital, you, it’s always, “What I’m going to do for you.” And then you screw up and it’s, “We did the best that we could, I’m dreadfully sorry.” And people like us live with your mistakes the rest of our lives.
They took back the offer.
That itself is such an interesting exchange, when you think about it. That people do put their lives in the hands of institutions. Lumet, many of his films, as I said, if you look at so many of them, they’re all about institutions, and the failure of institutions to serve ordinary people. And here of course, what is being suggested is, the woman goes into a hospital in order to have a child, and is completely messed up and her life is destroyed. The lawyer’s promise in, is that they can win the case, and effectively ensure that five or six times $200,000 is awarded. And of course they don’t think about the interest of the client, they’re thinking about their own interest, and they may be thinking about their own, this case, redemption. And the point about it is, it’s often worried me in relation to, in certainly practise of law, is the extent to which, you know, clients are so dependent on their legal representatives. And the question of that fiduciary relationship between the two is really very, very important, and often very problematic. And of course what is wonderful here is Newman saying, “I can win the case.” And I think what’s so marvellous if you just watch that clip, is his own desperation. I mean he’s really, you know, he’s seems much older than his 57 years at this particular point. It’s why it’s such an extraordinarily impressive performance. But he’s faced with a real problem, the problem that lawyers throughout the generations have been faced with. He’s faced with, in this case clearly a corrupt judge.
But even if the judge wasn’t corrupt, a judge who is a defendant’s judge, a judge who’s not prepared, as it were, to give the poor impecunious plaintiff a fair crack at the whip. And it’s at this particular point in time that Newman discovers his courage, that he’s suddenly pushed to the wall and the Frank Galvin character pushes back against the incredibly egregious behaviour of the judge, played by Milo O'Shea, quite wonderfully as well. A judge who is bending over backwards, as we shall see in the clip after this, to subvert the case which the plaintiff has brought. This is not an uncommon experience. We know, and I’ve spoken about this often, the identity of judges, who the judges are, so important in the outcome of a case. Now of course in this case, the colours are drawn in sharp relief, because the judge is really a corrupt, awful judge. But it does raise the problem about how even the scales are in justice, and Lumet is making a fundamental attack, as it were, on the impartiality of the system, which of course has been so much part of his entire film oeuvre. Well let’s just have a look now at this incredible exchange in chambers, which has taken place after Newman has been pushed to the wall by a judge utterly determined to subvert the case of the plaintiff.
I’m going to write to the board of bar overseers about you today fella, you’re on your way out. They should have kicked you out in that Lillibridge case. Now this is it today.
I’m an attorney on trial before the bar representing my client, my client. You open your mouth, you’re losing my case for me.
Now listen to me fella-
No, you listen to me. All I wanted out of this trial was a fair shake, okay? Push me into court five days early, I lose my star witness, and I can’t get a continuance and I don’t care. I’m going up there, I’m going to try it, I’m going to let the jury decide. You know, they told me about you, said you’re a hard-ass. you’re a defendant’s judge. Well I don’t care, I said to hell with it, to hell with it.
Look Galvin, many years ago-
Come on, hey don’t give me that shit about you being a lawyer too. I know about you, you couldn’t hack it as a lawyer. You were a bagman for the boys downtown and you still are, I know about you.
Are you done?
You’re damn right I’m done. I’m going to ask for a mistrial. I’m going to request that you disqualify yourself from sitting on this case. I’m going to take a transcript of the trial to the judicial conduct board and ask that they impeach your ass.
You aren’t going to get a mistrial, boy. We’re going back there this afternoon, and we’re going to try this case to the end. Now you get out of here before I call a bailiff, and have you thrown in jail.
What does it mean? I mean, you have other tactics?
Oh yeah, they present their case and then I get a chance, and we just cross-examine.
Are we going to win? I, I mean are you, you have other tactics though?
[Frank] Yeah.
I want to talk a little bit about the role of women in this film, but I’ll do so after the next couple of clips. It’s at this particular point in time, in which on the one hand, Newman has now essentially called the judge out. Of course what’s so wonderful is as he walks out, that sense of doubt, you know, “Have I overreached? Am I now in a position where I’ve totally jeopardised everything?” And he says, “I have other tactics,” knowing full well he doesn’t. And the desperation of the sister of the comatose woman, all of which was captured, and which is always so important in the way in which litigants in cases feel so powerless. Anybody who’s been in a case, anybody who’s been a litigant, a lawyer, knows that if you’ve been judged like I have for almost a quarter of a century, you watch in a sense how litigants feel almost powerless at the extent of what it is that their representatives are going to do, even when their representatives might well botch up. But before I get to the role of women in this case, which I think is quite interesting, and I want to share with you, let me just give some further context. So I said that the Charlotte Rampling character was bought by the defence lawyers. We’re going to come to them now. What is also important is that Newman, the Frank Galvin character, does finally find an expert medical doctor who’s going to testify about the fact that the anaesthetic was improperly given at a time, crucial to the point was when the woman ate. And the idea was whether she ate an hour before they gave the anaesthetic or nine hours before, which has clear implications for whether in fact they did a proper job in relation to the administering of the anaesthetic. And finally what occurs is that the defence use all of the resources influenced through the Catholic Church to ensure that Galvin’s one expert will not prepared to testify. He has been intimidated sufficiently to say, “No, I’m not going to do this.” So in desperation Galvin finds a doctor, Dr. Thompson, who’s prepared to testify. In this clip, which also I think shows the very great skill of James Mason as an actor, as the oleaginous defence lawyer, and just reflects as well just how cross-examination works and how to some extent, again, the judge that I’ve spoken to you about influences the process. It’s a very dramatic moment in the case, and let’s share it all together.
Good morning, Doctor. Dr. Thompson, just so the jury knows, you never treated Deborah Ann Kaye, is that correct?
[Thompson] That is correct. I was engaged to render an opinion.
Engaged to render an opinion, for a price. That is correct, you are being paid to be here?
Just as you are, sir.
Are you board certified in anesthesiology?
No, I’m not. It’s quite common in New York state to practise-
Yes, I’m quite sure it is, but this is Massachusetts. Are you board certified in internal medicine?
No.
Neurology?
No.
Orthopaedics?
I’m just an MD.
Ah, do you know Dr. Robert Towler?
I know of him.
How is that?
Through his book.
What book is that?
“Methodology and Practise”-
In, in anesthesiology, hmm.
“Methodology and Practise in Anesthesiology”, yes.
How old are you doctor?
I’m 74 years old.
Ah-ha, do you still practise quite a lot of medicine?
[Thompson] I’m on the staff of anesthesiology-
Yes, yes, I’ve heard that. But you do testify quite a bit against other physicians, isn’t that correct? You are available for that, so long as you’re paid to be there.
Sir, yes. When a thing is wrong, as in this case, I am available.
Mm-hmm.
I’m 74 years old, I’m not board certified, I’ve been practising medicine for 46 years and I know when an injustice has been done.
Do you indeed? I bet you do, it’s fine, fine. Let’s save the court time. We’ll admit Dr. Thompson as an expert witness.
Mr. Galvin, do you want to continue now? Or we could resume with Dr. Thompson this afternoon.
I’ll continue, Your Honour. Dr. Thompson, did you examine Deborah Ann Kaye at the Northern Chronic Care facility last night?
I did.
Objection.
Sustained yes, the witness will could find his testimony to review of the hospital records.
Dr. Thompson, in your review of the hospital records, May 12th, 1976, in your opinion, what happened to Deborah Ann Kaye?
Cardiac arrest, during delivery her heart stopped. When the heart stops, the brain is deprived of oxygen. You get brain damage. That’s why she’s in the state she’s in today.
Dr. Towler has testified that he restored the heartbeat in three to four minutes. Now in your opinion, is that an accurate estimate?
In my opinion it took much longer. Nine, 10 minutes, there’s too much brain damage.
Are you saying that a failure to restore the heartbeat within nine minutes in itself constitutes bad medical practise?
Your Honour?
Yes, Mr. Galvin.
If I may be permitted to question my own witness in my own way.
I’d just like to get to the point Mr. Galvin.
I’m getting to the-
Mr. Galvin, I believe I have the right to ask the witness a direct question. Now let’s not waste these people’s time. Answer the question, Mr. Witness please. Would a nine-minute lapse in restoring the heartbeat in and of itself be negligence?
In that small context, I would have to say no.
Then you’re saying there’s no negligence, based on my question.
Given the limits of your question, that’s correct.
The doctors were not negligent, thank you.
I’m not through questioning, Your Honour, with all due respect, if you’re going to try my case for me, I wish you wouldn’t lose it.
Thank you. I think that’s enough for this morning.
It’s a wonderful illustration, is it not, about the intervention of the judge? Even Dr. Thompson, who really can’t brag about writing books on anesthesiology or anything of that kind, starting to give evidence which is clearly in favour of the plaintiff, and the judge intervenes to subvert the entire, or thinks he does, which is interesting, before I get to the crucial piece of witness evidence, it’s interesting the role of women in this film. And there’ve been a couple of interesting feminist commentaries on “The Verdict”, because to a large degree, even though the case is about Deborah, she’s absent, other than essentially one scene where you see her comatose. Her sister, who really brings the case, is almost silent except for one of two issues. And of course one thinks about the fact that justice, the scales of justice are held by a woman, Justicia, and to a large degree women sort of are partly, are absent from this case, except for one dramatic moment where it is a woman nurse who stands up against all the power and all of the intimidation, ultimately wins the case for a desperate lawyer. The victim, as I say Deborah, we don’t really know much about her. We know her backstory. We know that she was a wife and a mother who was pregnant with her third child. We know she went to hospital to give birth. In the delivery room under a general aesthetic she threw up in her mask, choked on her vomit, her heart stopped as we heard, for a number of minutes. It took several minutes to restore breathing. By that time the baby was dead. She had suffered severe and permanent brain damage. Her husband we know abandoned her, taking their two children with them. She’s left in the care of the hospital.
Only her sister’s concerned about what’s to happen, and it’s the sister that retains Galvin. And in a way women are almost like the deus ex machina of this case. And you think, “Well, what role do they play at all?” And yet somehow Lumet, who’s often been criticised for this, produces a master stroke, and the master stroke is that there is one witness who knows the truth. And finally I might add, partly by the Galvin character, again illegally getting hold of certain correspondence which he shouldn’t have, and which had they known about it, would probably had him disbarred. He finds out that this nurse knows the truth, and finally prevails on her, Kaitlin Costello, to actually tell the truth. And there’s one other aspect about this, of course we always talked in cross-examination, never ask a question to which you do not know the answer. And here is the classic one minute, one and a half minutes, which swings the entire case the other way. And if we can have this clip of the cross-examination of Kaitlin Costello, revealed here in the picture by James Mason, who you have to agree plays the role of this kind of oleaginous lawyer pretty well.
Well, I want to ask something. Four years ago when you were working as a nurse, are you aware that these doctors, Marks and Towler, based their treatment of Deborah Ann Kaye on this admitting form, which you signed?
Yes.
On that oath, your initial KC, when you signed this form, you took an oath no less important than that which you’ve taken today, isn’t that right? Isn’t that right?
Yes sir.
Then which is right? You’ve sworn today that the patient ate one hour before admittance, years ago you swore that she ate nine hours before admittance. All right, which is the lie?
I-
You know that these men could have settled. They wanted a trial, they wanted clear their names. And you would come here, and on a slip of memory four years ago, you’d ruin their lives.
They lied.
They lied? They lied, when did they lie? Do you know what a lie is?
I do, yes.
[Defence Attorney] You swore on this form that the patient ate nine hours-
That’s not what I wrote.
[Defence Attorney] You just told me that you signed it.
I, yes I, yes I, I signed it, yes, but I didn’t write a nine, I wrote a one.
You didn’t write a nine, you wrote a one. And how is it that you remember, delayed four years?
Because I kept a copy. I have it right here.
Objection.
She had a copy, she had a copy of the admission certificate, which indicated that food had been given an hour, not nine hours, that they had illegally and fraudulently changed the certificate. Mason of course, does not know that when he asks the question, and of course this is the central piece of witness, of evidence. And what is so important about this, is this is where, the one place in the entire film, we have a woman who is presented, Rampling, as the spy. We have others who, passive, et cetera. But the one place, the central piece of justice is ultimately implemented, is by the nurse, who’s prepared finally to come stand up to the Catholic Church, stand up to Mason, and tell the truth. And so we come therefore to what always is the case, what is the jury going to do? And what we have before that is the final speech by the Newman character, which in a way is his ultimate act of redemption. He has been redeemed, because despite all of the odds, the truth finally has come out. And let’s listen to the last couple of minutes of his address to the jury.
We become weak. We doubt ourselves, we doubt our beliefs, we doubt our institutions, and we doubt the law. But today, you are the law. You are the law. Not some book, not the lawyers, not a, a marble statue, or the trappings of the court. See, those are just symbols of our desire to be just. Though they are, they are in fact a prayer, a fervent and a frightened prayer. In my religion they say, “Act as if you have faith. Faith will be given to you.” If, if we are to have faith in justice, we need only to believe in ourselves, and act with justice. See, I believe there is justice in our hearts.
There’s something pretty moving about the Jack Warden character just holding him, knowing, “You’ve done a great job,” and there’s something about him in that final speech, in which he has achieved redemption. It’s also remarkable to me, if I could just make two or three final points about the conclusion, that Paul Newman who must, on any account, be one of the most good-looking men who ever acted, plays this role in a way in which, you know, there’s that sort of level of desperation. His good looks are not an obstacle to the desperation that he conveys in the character, which is why it’s just such a remarkable performance. And in this final speech, he makes play of the fact, it’s not the books, and it’s not the precedence to some extent, it’s the question of whether the jury actually is prepared to follow the principle of justice. And it’s an interesting debate within our legal system, and within legal theory, as to the role of juries. The great social historian Edward Thompson once wrote that the jury system, which of course had been born in England, was one of the great gifts to civilization, because it allowed ordinary people to judge over other ordinary people. That it was perhaps the most democratic of all legal instruments. That instead of relying on one judge, ordinary people would judge other ordinary people. It’s an interesting debate. There’s a lot of research about this, which doesn’t indicate to the contrary, namely that judge kind of trials and jury trials, where there’ve been choices, have come to roughly the similar results.
But it’s an interesting debate, which I certainly raised in my inaugural lecture as a professor at UCT, way more than 30 years ago, without any success. Still seems to me something we should be debating. But what this film shows, in a way it certainly does, because obviously what you don’t know is that the jury finds for the plaintiff, and wants and recommends a very, very significant award, running into millions. And the point therefore is the case on behalf of Deborah, in a sense doesn’t give her redemption, 'cause she will never recover. But at least it’ll allow, as the sister said at the beginning, “Us to ensure that we can look after her for the rest of our lives and her life.” And at the end of the day, this alcoholic attorney who was down on the bones of his backside, who had essentially been subjected to spying by the Charlotte Rampling character, subversion by the judge, intimidation by the defence team, magnificently acted, I think, by James Mason, prevails. And in a sense that’s Lumet’s point. Just as he showed in “12 Angry Men”, that the jury can come to a verdict which promotes justice, so in this form, in a sense, he shows some faith, a liberal faith if you wish, in the nature of the legal system and the process of law. And in that way, for all of these reasons, it’s a film that I’ve shown often to my students, and I hope you too would’ve appreciated why I think it’s still one of the great films talking about court justice. I’ll just have a look whether there are any questions.
Q&A and Comments:
Yes, Mamet was also a Jew, I agree.
Thank you very much Rita, for putting up the clip, “I’m as mad as hell,” from “Network”, and those of you, particularly South Africans, who in a sense feel as frustrated and angry as I do about what happened in Johannesburg this week, may want to watch that.
Q: Is it Lumet?
A: Okay I wasn’t quite sure, Your Honour, how to pronounce that.
Yes, I agree about Paul Newman being one of the most magnificently good-looking men, but I think it’s that, it’s precisely that, which I think is, you know, so remarkable about his acting, and thank you very much Paula, for your kind remarks.
I shall be seeing you in a very different context later in the week, talking about Teshuvah. But do have a wonderful weekend, everybody.