Thesis: In 12 Angry Men, directed by William Friedkin and written by Reginald Rose used conflicts between characters to develop a story full of character reveals that show how personal bias, discrimination, and emotion can affect our justice system while compassion and logical thinking can protect it.Subarguments:
Plot development: In the film 12 Angry Men, there is a slow development that foreshadows each juror and their inner conflict on their final verdict of the defendant. In the beginning one juror stands in front of the 12 men not wanting to convict him without a proper investigation of the articles submitted in the court case. Each juror based their initial verdict of not guilty from personal conflicts which breaks down each character reveal as the film goes on. Juror #8 took his internal conflict that if he were on the stand, he would want justice for a fair trial. Rose revealed many dilemmas the jurors were facing that ultimately led to their quick decision of their verdict being guilty. Juror #4, was challenged with a question he was able to relate to from Juror #9.
Rose used character development and conflicts to build suspense and drama in this play and delivered the message of personal biases and understanding by showing the internal conflict each juror dealt with and how they grew after identifying it in this script.
Voice of the Author: I think one of the most unique things in 12 Angry Men, is the author was able to give nameless men such powerful roles without putting a name to them. Although in the film, they go through personal experiences that determine why they were so quick to judge a man as guilty, they were all nameless strangers. I feel like that is a powerful statement, being able to be connected with strangers and challenge internal/personal conflict.
I also believe there was a point being made about the American justice system, everyone has a right to a fair trial and good representation. But there could be flaws in the system if personal bias is a major conflict in determining a verdict.
Character development: In 12 Angry Men there are 12 characters who all have unique developments throughout the film. Starting with Juror #10, during the course of the film he is static, he does not care about the value of other human life except his own he is a racist. He represented the view of racism in the justice system but remained a static character because he did not grow from his realizations and outbursts he merely submitted to not guilty only because he knew he was outnumbered. His views did not change, and he did not change as a character in this story. The main antagonist Juror #3, does not make many changes at the beginning of the film and responds only with strong emotions such as anger and does not use much logical thinking when the case is being discussed and as the case discussion goes on the more upset and enraged he becomes. We start to see the turn of this juror in the discussion of the knife, that he can feel the knife himself from his son. This revealed that the character was acting on his bias from his estranged son, until he broke down and decided to vote not guilty. Juror #8, the protagonist changed my view on how static characters can be of good in a story since I have mostly recognized static as being all evil and the all good never really brought momentum to a film to effect the outcome. Juror #8, brought out the dynamic aspect to each other juror by convincing them that there was reasonable doubt and spent the jury deliberations having each juror make their case and assessing their own biases that interfered with them being able to properly access the case and find reasonable doubt.
Voice of a character: In the film 12 Angry Men, the protagonist juror #8 started out unsure of the proper conviction for the defendant but went against the rest of the jurors to say not guilty because he believed that he deserved for them to make a case. What juror #8 had that the other jurors lacked was compassion to see justice and the truth with the defendant having the right to a fair trial. While some of the other jurors spoke up and agreed that everyone has a right to a fair trial, they let their personal bias and conflicts determine their initial verdict. The protagonist used his confidence to break down the evidence, and became a confident voice of reason while deliberations were occurring.
Implicit theme: The theme in 12 Angry Men, the theme is implicit only because there was no clear statement of them looking for reasonable doubt through the trials of each juror going through their personal reflections of prejudice and personal biases. Juror #8 led each juror through seeking the truth, and used reasonable doubt to lead the other jurors into not making their decision based off their personal bias as this is how it should be in the American justice system.
SECONDARY SOURCE TO BE USED IN ESSAY:
“The movie 12 Angry Men starts by showing lay participation at its worst. The discussion is cursory. The jurors exchange insults and putdowns. The comments about the trial and defendant reflect snap judgement and prejudice. In short, the men are really bad jurors. But deliberation transforms the men into thoughtful jurists who consider the evidence more deeply and reason through it to their collective verdict.” (Hans)
In this article it goes through how 12 Angry Men puts the emphasis on the power of deliberation and how juries work in different ways and how they organize their deliberation process. These divergent approaches have been labeled as evidence-driven verdicts. How they were able to develop a common understanding of the facts, leads to a unanimous verdict.
Hans, Valerie. Cornell Law School “Deliberation and Dissent: 12 Angry Men Versus
the Empirical Reality of Juries” https://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1381&context=facpub