visual analysis essay on the movie - "Shadow of a Doubt"

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Christopher Engle Mrs. Carpenter English 1301 27 November, 2016

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Angry Men in a Bleak World

“12 Angry Men” was directed by Sidney Lumet in 1956 (IMDb). The story of the film follows twelve jurors who are charged with the task of determining if a young man is guilty or innocent for his father’s death. Soon after the movie starts, one of the jurors claims “this is gonna be the hottest day of the year” (12 Angry Men). This could be subtle foreshadowing that the following events are going to be of extreme importance to each of these men. None of the jurors realize how this case will change their view on the judicial system. The movie uses space and cinematography along with along with the storm to demonstrate the dark time of the era’s judicial system and create a rhetoric appeal to pathos for the audience. Comment by Patti Carpenter: The title is in italics. MECH

Shortly after the film starts, each of the twelve men agree to vote to decide if the young man is guilty. Eleven of the men vote guilty while the last one votes innocent. The man who voted innocent did not vote because he thinks that the boy is innocent, but to prevent the boy from being immediately sent to the electric chair. Cinematography is used during this time period as each of the men remain around the table, while the room retains a certain amount of brightness to it. The juror who voted innocent goes on to explain that the boy had a rough childhood and grew up in the slums. The juror is trying to appeal to the men emotionally saying that they should not send the boy off without talking about it first. The rest of the men begin to push back with the facts presented during the trial and bring out the knife that was used in the stabbing of the murder. The juror who voted innocent turns the tables on everyone when he reveals he bought a knife exactly like the “very unusual knife (12 Angry Men).” The man stabs the knife into the table right next to the murder knife and the camera zooms in on the closeness of the knives next to each other. The closeness of the knives is an aspect of space and cinematography to represent how identical the knives are. Comment by Patti Carpenter: Subj/verb agr.---each is singular. Each….agrees. MECH Comment by Patti Carpenter: Subj/verb agr

As the plot progresses some of the other jurors are swayed to vote innocent for varying reasons. The votes for innocent and guilty are split evenly six to six. During this passage of time a storm starts up. Cinematography is used for the storm to symbolize the atmosphere of the room, how dark and muddled it is for the jurors and their conflict. One of the remaining arguments against the boy’s innocence is that the boy could not recall the names of the films he watched on the night of his father’s murder. A juror questions another juror about a film he saw days ago and the juror being questioned could not remember the details of the film. A point is proven that if he could not remember these details, how could they expect a young man in emotional distress to remember the details of his night while being questioned in the vicinity of his dead father? Cinematography captures the sweat rolling down the questioned juror’s face to amplify the visual doubt he now has. Comment by Patti Carpenter: Which appeal is this? DEVELOP

Soon after they call for another vote, the tally is now nine for innocent and three for guilty. One of the jurors who voted guilty then goes on a rant, talking about how “these picky little points don’t mean nothing… you know how these people lie, it’s born in them (12 Angry Men).” Here the camera starts out focused on the ranting man and pans out to include the entire room. While the camera is panning out, each of the jurors begin to stand up and turn their backs on the ranting man. The distance these men put between them and the ranting man signifies that they will not listen to him anymore due to his blatant disregard of the arguments they have put together for the trial. When each of them were sitting at the table, they would listen to one another’s thoughts. With the greater physical distance between them along with their backs turned to the ranting man at the table, space and cinematography are used to portray their dissenting opinions.

The last piece of evidence against the boy is a testimony by a woman who claims she saw the boy murder his father. This evidence is eventually thrown out because the jurors determine that the woman wears glasses, yet she showed up to court without them. They come to the conclusion that the woman did not have enough time to put her glasses on to clearly see who murdered the father. The camera is panned in on the juror who claims the woman had the marks of someone who wears glasses on the sides of her nose. This is to show that the only juror left that had reasonable doubt on the young man being innocent now has reasonable doubt to the young man’s guiltiness. He fully believes the young man is innocent now because of the imprints on the woman’s nose because he also wears glasses. Comment by Patti Carpenter: Which appeal is this? DEVELOP

With all of the jurors finally deciding to vote not guilty, the young man is spared. The final scene shows two of the jurors meeting again outside. As they greet each other they exchange names. The camera focuses on them as they walk away and integrate into the crowd of people. This particular scene shows how these men who were jurors that changed their opinions on the case are just members of society. If these men can change, so can society. The ending also is a representation of the film transforming from a bleak film to a brighter film. The small, dreary room that has been the setting of the film has finally changed to the brighter outside world.

Film noir is represented in this movie through the bleak cinematography of the movie (“Film Noir – Films.”). The tiny enclosed room and the opinions of the jurors on the young man’s life add on to the feeling of this movie being bleak. The storm is a huge part of the cinematography of the movie that is used to demonstrate the bleakness of the film. These used elements of space and cinematography together create a film that embodied the film noir style and demonstrated an earlier time of the judicial system in the United States.

Works Cited

12 Angry Men. Dir. Sidney Lumet. Prod. Henry Fonda and Reginald Rose. By Reginald and Kenyon Hopkins. Perf. Henry Fonda, Martin Balsam, John Fiedler, Lee J. Cobb, E. G. Marshall, Hack Klugman, Edward Binns, Jack Warden, Joseph Sweeney, Ed Begley, Jiří Voskovec, and Mark Rodgers. United Artists Corp., 1956. DVD.

“Film Noir – Films.” Film Noir – Films. N.p., n.d. Web. Accessed 27 Nov. 2016.

IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. Accessed 27 Nov. 2016.