Released in 1957, the film has only 12 male protagonists, no female characters, and no supporting actresses. The scenes in this film are very simple, lasting 1.5 hours, of which 1 hour and 25 minutes are in a house. However, the plot setting is very tight, and it can be said that there are no urine spots throughout the whole process. In 2015, Chinese director Xu Angpai's "Twelve Citizens" was a tribute to "Twelve Angry Men".
An 18-year-old boy was sued for murder of his father, and the witnesses were so conclusive that the evidence was extremely unfavorable to him. The old man who lived downstairs heard the teenager say, "I'm going to kill you," and the old man walked out the door quickly to see the teenager rushing out. The woman across the road saw the teenager kill his father, the most important evidence of the spring knife, and the teenager also lost the same spring knife.
A jury of twelve people of different professions was formed, and they agreed in the lounge to decide whether the juvenile was guilty or not, and if convicted, the juvenile would be sentenced to death.
At first, everyone was very relaxed and casual, as long as they did not object to the witness evidence, the vote passed, and the teenager would be sentenced to death. The twelve men had one presiding, the presiding officer asked all to vote, and the eleven members voted guilty, as long as jury No. 8 voted "not guilty." Everyone was surprised and asked No. 8 to explain the reason.
Number 8 said, "I'm not saying he's innocent, I just think we twelve people should take the death of a child seriously and not be too casual." So I voted innocent."
The host asked 12 people at the scene to express their views on the case. Each gave their own reasons for the juvenile's guilt. On the 8th, he said, "A very special spring knife at the scene of the crime, the teenager has one, in fact, others can also have one, I have the same type of spring knife, which I bought in the second-hand store the day before yesterday." Everyone was surprised to see the No. 8 jury take out the same spring knife! No. 8 continued: "I propose to vote again, by secret ballot, I will not participate in the vote, if everyone feels that the juvenile is still guilty, I will also vote for the juvenile guilty."
Everyone agreed, secret ballot, did not expect that this time someone voted not guilty, currently 10 to 2. Joining the innocent team this time was an old man who said, "I agree with No. 8, I support No. 8."
No. 8 said: "The teenager's motive for killing his father is also insufficient, and his relationship with his father is not good, which cannot be the motivation for the teenager to kill his father." We say a lot of radical things every day, but very few of them become facts. ”
The testimony of the woman across the road, an important witness in the case, was: "As the tram passed, she saw the teenager killing her own father through the glass of the last two carriages". No. 8 said: "The tram passes through a point for more than ten seconds, the tram passes through the loud sound, the old man downstairs hears the child say 'I want to kill you', it is impossible to hear, the old man is very likely not to hear, I infer the old man's vanity, or the old man's auditory hallucinations caused the old man to have such a statement." ”。
More and more people are joining the "innocent" ranks. It has reached 6 to 6.
The jury comes from all walks of life, and each has its own specific life scenario. There are business owners, there are people who sit in small businesses, there are ordinary people, there are old people, and people who are particularly impulsive, the different life scenes of each other, the more in-depth the discussion, the clearer the boundaries between them.
The final suspicion was that the woman across the road saw the boy's testimony of killing his father. Someone in court they saw that the woman's nose had a pair of small pits, must have been caused by wearing glasses, most likely myopia, 12 o'clock at night, the moment of the crime, whether the woman really saw it, there was doubt.
The latest vote, the number of "innocent" votes is already 11 votes.
Only one member of the jury remained to vote the juvenile "guilty." He came with emotions, six years ago, he had an argument with his son, who had not returned after 6 years away from home, and he was particularly sad and angry, and he wanted revenge. The moderator initiates the final vote. Every Ren raised his hand to vote "not guilty", and he immediately broke down, and the crying man cast a "not guilty" vote.
Everyone left the little house, and they all went home to their own homes and returned to their most normal lives.
It's a black-and-white film, and the content is simple, voting to decide whether a teenager is "guilty" or "innocent." And in everything that favors certainty, do people just go along with the outcome of things? Or doubt the results that are about to take shape.
