12 Angry Men Movie Summary

(1) The movie begins in the courtroom with the judge addressing to the jurors that they must keep their oath and make the best decision for the victim with all of the knowledge that they have received from listening to the case. The jurors are then directed into a small room. Tables have been pushed together in the middle to make one big meeting-like table, surrounding with enough chairs to seat the twelve male jurors. After all twelve jurors are settled into the room, the bailiff/officer locks the door. The jurors shuffle throughout the room, trying to get comfortable. The weather outside is told to be very hot, so most of the men are sweating profusely; the windows were their only source of relief from the heat since they could not get the

After they have sat down, they begin to discuss the case, but it is done very briefly. They then hold an open vote by raising their hands, which results to a 11-1; eleven believe that the suspect is guilty, one man does not. The other men criticize the man who voted not guilty (juror #8). (7) The majority of the men voted guilty, simply to leave. Juror #7 even tells the group that he wants the thing over with so he can go to the ballgame he had tickets for. Juror #8 is irritated with the group because they weren’t treating the case with any care. He clarifies that he didn’t choose ‘not guilty’ because he believed it but because he wanted to look deeper into the case, and make sure that the verdict is correct so they don’t send an innocent man to prison. (3) Juror #8 is very patient with the group, even though most of the group was very disrespectful towards him. (6) Actually, most of the jurors were intimidating each other

It was of course juror #3, who was beyond stubborn and irrational. He began to get very angry because he felt as though he had been betrayed by them all. Juror #8, being the civil person he is, urged him to make his evidence and claims as to why still believed the suspect was guilty. Juror #3 kept repeating the same old evidence, that was already proven to be inaccurate. He was clearly unsure of what he believed by the way he spoke (or yelled), but he was so adamant about the boy being guilty that nothing else mattered. He begins to cry and yell about his son (who he previously said had left him) indirectly. The rest of the jurors begin to understand why he is hateful towards the boy-- he saw the boy as his own son, the one who abandoned him, and he saw the father as himself. Juror #8 assures him that the boy is not his son. He realizes his bias and changes his vote. The vote is then twelve-- or all-- in favor of ‘not guilty’. (2) After all the new evidence was presented, I felt grateful that juror #8 decided to vote ‘not guilty’ and held his ground even after he was pressured into changing his vote. With the new evidence, I would definitely say that the suspect is not guilty. (11) The public and the press would probably react negatively to the juror’s decision of ‘not guilty’ because they will not have the knowledge that the jurors do. Their knowledge of the