The audio.. the way the sound of everything, the voices, papers ruffling, cigarette puffing, ice and whisky in a glass.. something is done remarkably well with the sound recording/editing. It really stands out to me. Great movie. Very well made
I always remember that mantra of Mamet, " There are no other cases, this is the case! " Newman's finest hour and the supporting cast is exemplary. Brilliant film!
One of the best acting performances in all movie history. Yet even back in 1982, Hollywood was HollyWOKE; thus, they HAD to give Best Actor to Ben Kingsley for "Gandhi" instead that same year. Ben was very, very good in his role/makeup, yes; but Newman was simply STELLAR in The Verdict and deserved Best Actor hands down.
As well as the film being one of the best I’ve ever seen, it also nailed what Boston is all about..... which isn’t easy! It’s a complicated, corrupt, perfect city!
Too bad they didn't include brief interviews with Milo O'Shea, Charlotte Rampling, and Lindsay Crouse. Newman, Mason, Warden, O'Shea, Rampling, and Crouse make a powerful ensemble.
This movie showed me something sad. That Paul Newman was so good yet had never been given the roles his talent deserved. He could have made 10 movies where the character was as complex and the film as brilliant but unfortunately he was only given a handful of scripts through out his life that his talent deserved.
You seem to be right about the few scripts that Paul Newman received that garnered his attention. In a later interview he mentioned that he used to pine over the fact that no good material was sent his way. What are the point, he said it's simply didn't exist.
I read the book and the movie is much better because of the screenplay by Mamet. This was Newman's very best acting and so down to earth that you really felt for his predicament. The beginning of the movie where he falls against the wall and furniture as a drunk was outstanding as was his final speech to the court was very moving.
The thing about this movie is this: the novel its based on is pretty bad. I read it after I saw the film. I was amazed at what script writer David Mamet did with it. He saw the basic conflict in it, and then sharpened up the characters and gave it memorable dialogue. Everything in the film is understated as drama, modernist in that regard. It goes from one crisis to another topped off by the penultimate scene. Lumet never directed better, Newman was just excellent.
It’s up to the client not the lawyer to decide whether to accept a settlement offer. Failure to communicate the offer to the client is a breach of ethics. But it makes for good drama.
Paul's a handsome, handsome, man ...beautiful man ...when you chisel out a man, Paul is close to what you want for handsome, and beauty ...kept himself in fine shape too ...as Tom Cruise does, also 🎭🧸
The verdict 6 Jun 2015 Today I have the house to myself, and the Epsom Derby, notwithstanding. I decided that I would record one of my all time favourite films " The Verdict" which was shown this afternoon on the Sony Movie Channel. I have always felt that Paul Newman thoroughly deserved the highest accolades for his Riveting performance in the lead role. Newman plays an Irish American, Boston lawyer named Frank Galvin, who once had a promising law career in front of him but he miss handled a case which resulted in him being fired from his job with a prestigious, Ivy League law firm, which in turn cost him his marriage. In the opening scenes we discover that he is an alcoholic ambulance chasing, lawyer who preys on the weak and vulnerable. Franks loyal friend Mickey Morrissey played by character actor jack warden offers him the chance to represent a disabled woman in a personal injury case against the Archdiocese of Boston and two highly respected doctors Towler and Marks. The unfortunate woman had been left in a vegetative coma as a result of the medical negligence of her anaesthetist during the delivery of her baby. The Verdict is Paul Newman's finest performance on screen, and that is a big statement when you consider other performances in films such as "Cool Hand Luke", "The Drowning Pool", "The Sting”, “Hombre", and "Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid". I don't count the Oscar he won in "The Colour of Money" for that performance as "Fast Eddie Feltson", it was only an after thought by the Academy, he really should have won it the first time around in “The Hustler.” Newman's performance was enhanced by brilliant supporting performances from James Mason, who played big time lawyer "Ed Concannon", Charlotte Rampling, Jack Warden and our own Milo O'Shea, who is as famed for his instantly recognisable eyebrows as he is for his versatile talents, in the role of the corrupt "Judge Hoyle". The plot was complex, but the pace of the direction was so flawlessly brilliant that it flowed effortlessly, to the extent that a child could understand. There are several interesting moral and legal issues raised in the film, such as the corruptible nature of the litigation process. The ruthlessness of big legal firms, the seemingly impossible struggle of the underdog for what is right, and how when that “right” is denied it can be difficult to see the boundaries of where justice ends and the salvation that only revenge can express, actually begins. The human need for justice and truth and the horrendous damage that can be done by personal betrayal and treachery can provide the most compelling of backdrops for an intriguing unfolding of the plot in a riveting story In relation to the above issues the story does a brilliant job of exploring each in a clear and sensitive manner. Along his journey to the truth, Newman's Character, - burned out, alcoholic lawyer Frank Galvin, who once had a bright future. During his work on this case, Frank “accidentally" stumbles into life affirming dalliance with the bright and beautiful Laura Fischer, played by Charlotte Rampling, (I am a big fan). All of a sudden there is a twinkle in his eye, a spring in his step and a stone for the slingshot of David in his battle with Goliath. He feels alive for the first time in decades as a result of falling in love with this intelligent, articulate, witty and classically beautiful, latter day Venus. Later on in the film when Frank finds out that Laura has been supplying information about his case strategy to the " Goliath" legal firm, fronted by Concannon, and she is being paid handsomely for spying on him. Frank agrees to meet her in a bar of a New York hotel after he has finally tracked down his star witness. She was hoping that Frank would be so excited that he would reveal everything to her, and then she could give the heads up to the baddies. When Frank walks into the hotel, he looks drawn, conflicted and even tortured. He wants to believe that she is for real and not a fraud. There is an extended silence where they glare into each other's eyes from 20 feet away. The look on Laura's face tells Frank that she is guilty of the most horrific betrayal. He realises that he was set up and the dreams and plans he had made in his mind would come to nothing as they were all based on a lie. In the moment that followed Frank quickly closed the distance between them and slapped her face. Given the gravity of her treachery, this was the very minimum she could have expected. Men who were in the bar and witnessed the slap hurriedly wrestled Frank away and tended to Laura who had fallen over and was bleeding from her lip. One wanted to call the police, but Laura said "No", as she knew that she had engineered the whole mess herself. She immediately felt remorse for what she had done, and Frank was so emotionally devastated that a trip down town in a black and white would have seemed like therapy. This is both a pivotal and poignant scene, in many ways the most important scene in the entire movie. The entire relationship between the two lead characters has led up to this scene, and it changes everything. To my horror, Sony had cut out the scene completely. This completely changes the impact and the ramifications of the film. This is like taking a grecian statue of Venus and painting a swim suit on it. Obviously, the whole "man hits woman" paradigm is such a huge taboo, even where the man is the good guy and the woman is the baddie, that Sony feel that they can arbitrarily destroy someone else's art and that, in and of itself, is totally justifiable, because radicle feminists will not make a bonfire of their bras outside their head offices. In deleting the scene for the sake of political correctness, what kind of message are the Thought Police of Sony Entertainment sending out to young women who are watching this treasured art work for the first time? Is it now ok or even "cool" for a woman to prostitute herself for personal gain? Is it "cool" to toy with the feelings and emotions of another vulnerable human being and make him believe that you “have his back” while all the time you are plunging a knife into it? Is it "cool" to destroy the lives of innocent people, pervert the course of justice through underhandedness, lies and deceit? Are Sony copper-fastening the notion that a woman should get away with these things in a fallout-free, consequence-free world where the only role a woman is capable of playing is that of a "victim"? I wonder if Sony movies sought the opinion or the consent of the copyright owners before they deleted what in my opinion is a pivotal scene in the movie? I wonder if the creator of the story or indeed the script writers who brought it to the screen feel abused that their work and their creative and artistic freedom been tampered with in such a way that it loses something of its gravitas, impact and depth? No enlightened, empowered or intelligent woman, who is committed to the concepts of Artistic Freedom, fair play, and freedom of expression could possibly go along with this kind of ill-conceived, knee-jerk, nanny State censorship, ... or could they?