good back-story, and good acting

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

ANATOMY OF A MURDER is a mystery courtroom drama, which, in one explicit manner, deals with issues of sex and rape. The film was based on the 1958 novel of the same name by Michigan Supreme Court Justice John D. Voelker.One former local prosecutor has taken a peculiar case. Specifically, an army lieutenant has confessed to killing his wife's rapist. The lieutenant, with the help of his new defense attorney, claims that he does not remember the murder. The main feature of the defendant is temporary mental incapacity. However, some visible facts are not on his side....The story is interesting and somewhat realistic. It was complemented with a sharp dialogue and explicit themes. Mr. Preminger has presented a dramatic, but a proper and comprehensive judicial process. He has pointed, through some notable scenes, the difference between law and justice. The protagonists are shifty characters in an uncertain courtroom drama. The conflict is reduced to a battle between prosecutors and defense counsel, through comic theatricality and mutual insinuations.James Stewart as Paul Biegler is a clever and resourceful lawyer. The protagonist who, with his petty bourgeois, regularly draws aces from the hole. Mr. Stewart has offered, as usual, very good performance. Lee Remick as Laura Manion is rather unconvincing as a faithful and flirty wife at the same time. The complexity is perhaps the biggest flaw of her character. However, I think that Mr. Preminger has wanted to provoke an ironic attitude towards her character by the audience. George C. Scott as Claude Dancer is a skilled and consistent prosecutor, who has become a sort of antagonist. Ben Gazzara as Lt. Frederick Manion is a cold and nervous defendant. Joseph N. Welch as Judge Weaver, despite his sporadic cynicism, is too stereotypical character.This is a bit tiring, but very interesting trial, which, through ironic and cynical attitudes, solves the mystery.

James Stewart plays Biegler, attorney of Manion (Ben Gazzara), charged with the murder of a man who reportedly raped Manion's wife Laura (Lee Remick).The plot could have made for standard genre schlock (think Joel Schumacher's A Time to Kill), but Anatomy of a Murder is sly, ironic, rich in psychological detail and characterization, focusing on the chess-like courtroom tactics between Biegler and the prosecutor (George C. Scott).A lesser, more obvious movie would have made the defendant a sympathetic, righteous avenger and his wife as pure as the driven snow; here they are both unsavory, untrustworthy types. And Biegler is not a man on a mission, just a professional who tries to do his job at the best of his considerable abilities. Stewart is wonderful, of course, and the rest of the cast is on par.9/10

Most court drama have an agenda going in - a bias to uncover and attack, a crime to solve, a mystery to unlock. They feel almost like a detective novel at times; information is doled out as required and at the end the audience is satisfied by how the script has forged a perfect and neat conclusion from the bits and pieces. Otto Preminger's Anatomy of a Murder does not follow this framework. It doesn't have a pre-planned narrative it wants to unfold, or an angle that wants to be highlighted. There are the usual courtroom flourishes, but they echo a sentiment from Preminger that these should not be dramatised or glamourised in any way, lest they mar the objectivity of the jury process. But of course, they do. Preminger's actors understand the roles that they play - how their roles are doubled in themselves, how they have to step up in the courtroom as lawyers putting on a performance. Stewart is brilliant; he slips so easily into that persona as if it was like putting on a hat himself, and making the weary hobby fisherman disappear. To win this case he doesn't need a justification, just an excuse, as he so snidely whispers to Manion at the beginning. And then he makes a big show out of it, pushing the rules of the courtroom to its peak theatricality: throwing his hands up into the air at injustice served, loudly slamming his palm into the opposition's table, using wisecracks at the right moments, and crucial, perfectly planned accusatory questions that are struck off from the record, but not from the jury's minds, or the screen. Preminger makes a clear note of these occurrences, because it happens many times and with great effect on the case.Lee Remick knows her role too, to be the fetching, coquettish object of desire that may or may not be the adulterous trigger that starts this chain of events. She doesn't seem like a rape victim, some have pointed out. She is of course deliberately flirtatious and touchy-feely because Preminger wants to throw her claims up into the air. Remick shows great range here, from the way she flashes a dazzling smile and flourishes her long golden locks (again, a performance intended to show off) when asked to remove her hat and shed the puritan image, to the way she breaks down into tears on the stand, and how her first appearance is sprawled out seductively on the couch at Biegler and asking her to address him as Laura. We see persuasive arguments for both sides of this women, and from both the defense and prosecution - we see all the facts, all the testimonies, all the research that Biegler goes through to prepare his position.And even at 2 hours 40 minutes it doesn't seem a touch dull at all. The scenes of the courthouse proceedings themselves could have been boring and dragging, but they are livened by a script that is quick on its toes and clearly communicates all the legal jargon, as well as imaginative staging. The triangles that Leavitt composes drip with dramatic intensity - always a figure lurking in the middle background gazing intently, eyes flicking from head to head, as the momentum swings back and forth. So delicately is this handled that even nearing the ending of the film with mere minutes to go, we have no idea what the jury's outcome will be. Preminger doesn't offer straight, simple answers, but offers the audience a seat in the jury itself, and shows us how these facts can be twisted in that fateful building.

Paul Biegler (James Stewart) is a former district attorney who lost his re-election. He spends his days fishing and talking to his alcoholic friend Parnell McCarthy (Arthur O'Connell) and his secretary Maida Rutledge (Eve Arden). Army lieutenant Frederick Manion (Ben Gazzara) is arrested for the murder of bartender Barney Quill who supposedly raped his wife Laura (Lee Remick). Biegler leads him to claim insanity. Laura is flirty and Fred is jealous. Assistant DA Claude Dancer (George C. Scott) from the capital Lansing comes to co-chair the prosecution. James Stewart is impeccably solid. The acting is generally terrific. Ben Gazzara is filled with intensity and Lee Remick is acting through her sweater. The plot is a bit long-winded and it's a bit slower than the modern legal procedural. The movie has some of the minutia of court procedures. However this is still a great classic courtroom drama.