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Runaway Jury
(Reviewed September 24, 2003)
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Left-wing fathead Michael Moore and his ilk have gotta love this moronic, ridiculously one-sided gun-control advocates' wet dream about a widow's lawsuit against a gun manufacturer. This being a
lousy-with-liberals Hollywood flick, the gunmakers are naturally portrayed as wild-eyed, conspiring criminal overlords. (When one of them takes the stand, he becomes so frothingly, belligerently apoplectic
while shouting about his 2nd Amendment rights that he nearly bursts a vessel. Yeah, I can really picture this guy getting the backing of a board of directors in today's corporate America.)
In John Grisham's original novel (which I have not read), the lawsuit was not even about guns, but about suing tobacco companies. I have no idea how much else was changed in the trip from
printed page to screen, but Grisham purists can consider themselves warned.
John Cusack plays a Guy With a Secret who somehow gets himself on the jury of exactly the case he wants, which shows right off how credible and realistic things are going to be. He has a
"meet-cute" at a candle shop with Rachel Weisz, a scene that makes no sense whatsoever later, considering that the two already share a long acquaintance and are, as they say, "in cahoots." The howlingly
unbelievable plot involves Cusack and Weisz trying to get either party to the lawsuit to pay up big bucks, in exchange for which Cusack will swing the jury's verdict.
Assisting the gun manufacturer, Gene Hackman is a shady, viciously amoral jury consultant who must have entered that career after spending time running the CIA, considering that he sets up a
dazzlingly high-tech superspy command center full of huge plasma screens that looks like an upgraded version of Tom Cruise's "Minority Report" workplace. He somehow has bugged the courtroom with
listening devices and cameras (several of them, apparently, letting him switch between multiple angles of the action) that escape the detection of the mere mortals therein. Harry Caul certainly has gone
upscale! (Somehow, though, he has not managed to get any cameras or microphones in the jury room...or into Cusack's apartment...or into the motel where the jury eventually is sequestered. Which I guess
means that it is easier to sneak A/V guys into a public courtroom than into any of those other places. Sure, that makes sense...NOT.)
Hackman actually turns in a great performance in a role that could have been mere moustache-twirling villainy, because he seems to take such happy satisfaction in being bad. This is a guy who likes his dirty
work. The movie may be garbage, but at least he's having fun.
Dustin Hoffman is the grieving widow's lawyer, employing the same tired old bag of tics and weird grins and shuffling that has endeared him to a grateful nation. The guy has become as much a
catalog of predictable mannerisms as Lt. Columbo by now.
The worst thing about the movie (well, aside from its general air of idiocy and preposterously last-minute nick-o'-time plot developments) is that not one single good argument is given to the "right
to bear arms" side during the trial. Whether this was done out of laziness or contempt (I have my suspicions) doesn't matter. What matters is this: It is completely unbelievable that the gun manufacturing
industry would be willing to spend literally millions of dollars to defend themselves, yet would not manage to get a lawyer who is anything better than an indecisive buffoon -- one who cannot offer even the
simplest of arguments to support his case. The lawsuit involves a workplace shooter who has killed several employees at a stockbroker's office. The gun side's legal team could have suggested that the
shooter would have been "nullified" a little earlier if one of those employees had a handgun of his own. The defense team could have pointed out that guns come in pretty handy for home protection, and that
their misuse is no more the manufacturers' fault than graffiti is the fault of a paint maker. He could have asked what brand of handgun the police who apprehended the shooter were carrying, and if that
manufacturer is any less culpable than his client for unintended incidents. Hell, the defense could have simply argued "personal responsibility," rightly pointing out that guns don't kill people, people kill
people. But no. This, I submit, is insulting to the intelligence.
And at least one person in the movie should have bemoaned the fact that ridiculous "blame somebody other than the person who did it" lawsuits like this are not immediately thrown out of court. I
just heard over the weekend about a lawsuit that has been filed by the parents of a protester who was killed in the West Bank when Israeli troops bulldozed a wall on top of her. Who is the family suing?
Why, Caterpillar, or course -- the maker of the bulldozer.
Lock and load, America!
Back Row Grade: F
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