Image courtesy of www.impawards.com
Director :
Sidney Lumet
Cast :
Vin Diesel……….Giacomo ‘Fat Jack’ DiNorscio
Ron Silver……….Judge Finestein
Alex Rocco……….Nick Calabrese
In any film about the Mafia there’s always a reference to honor and certain codes amongst themselves about how they handle certain situations. Once upon a time there were mantras such as “never rat out your friends” that were much stronger than they are now. The myth of the mob is in its loyalty, and from this world comes Jack DiNorscio (Vin Diesel), one of many mobsters on trial by the government for racketeering. In fact, his whole mobster “family” is being tried by the U.S Attorney in Federal Courts at once. What would proceed would be the longest trial in US judicial history, lasting nearly two years and resulting in a verdict that shocked everyone. From this adventure in jurisprudence comes Find Me Guilty, a look at the trial from the perspective of low level mobster DiNorscio.
Other than the verdict, one of the major parts of the trial was DiNorscio’s legal counsel. The lack thereof would be most appropriate, as he represented himself for the trial. Many times resembling a stand up comedy act, DiNorscio’s defense of himself and his actions, as well as those of his fellow mobsters, is brought to life in the latest courtroom cinematic experience from veteran director Sidney Lumet. It’s obvious Lumet knows his away around a courtroom, as his other major work in the courtroom was Oscar nominated 12 Angry Men, and in many ways his direction is very reminiscent of his earlier work. He doesn’t use any sort of fancy camera tricks or angles, relying on several types of shots and allowing the action to dominate the screen. Lumet is impressive in how he handles certain situations; with 12 Angry Men it was a matter of using camera angles to create a sense of claustrophobia, in Find Me Guilty he uses the camera work to show the film’s epic size in terms of actual size. Everything he does is to emphasize the size of the courtroom, the multitude of defendants, the quantity of evidence and the sheer size of it all.
Lumet also moves his story forward with a rather well-timed pace. For a trial that last well over 600 days, he conveys the length of time without slowing the pace of the film down. By necessity the pace is slow just due to the time frame he’s covering, but Lumet is able to keep the pace slow but still moving evenly. Time goes by, but it doesn’t accelerate by; he’s able to convey a great sense of time while not making it feel like an eternity. He’s able to take a lot of the court room humor from the trial and mesh it with a dramatically-enhanced version of the events outside of it and blend them together to form a charming narrative.
And normally two hours of Vin Diesel acting feels like one, as he doesn’t have the reputation of being a skilled thespian. He’s shown some acting chops in smaller doses (Saving Private Ryan) and in films that haven’t enjoyed massive popularity (Boiler Room), but this is his first shot at carrying a film without needing explosions or car chases and he does it wonderfully. Jack is a foul-mouthed gangster with a sixth grade education and yet he’s eminently likeable due to Diesel’s presence. He has a lot of natural charisma and screen presence, but this is the first time that he’s doing something requiring him to keep his shirt on and he succeeds wonderfully. While his court room antics were taken directly from the court transcripts, outside the court room DiNorscio is a good man who genuinely loves both of his families.
And this would be a great film, as opposed to just a very good one, if not for the film’s hackneyed editing. Lumet has obviously had to cut out a bunch of material for the film in order to keep a two hour running length but a lot of what has been taken out doesn’t sync up. It’s noticeable in large chunks of the court room sequences, as it’s distracting to see a character walking and in the next shot it’s fast forwarded to the same character sitting down.
