Juror #2 Review

It’s surrounded by questions. Juror #2 director, Clint Eastwood, is 94 and retirement speculation is inevitable although, in typically reserved style, he’s said nothing on the subject. His 40^th film behind the camera, however, is getting noticeably meagre distribution on the other side of The Pond from his long-term studio, Warner Brothers, but UK audiences can look forward to seeing it at most of the big chains, at the very least. And see it they should.

Time was – especially in his 1990s heyday – that an Eastwood film was an event. That hasn’t been the case for his most recent outings, but Juror #2 is something of a throwback. It has all his hallmarks and, while it’s not the director at his absolute best, it comes pretty darn close. With a premise and a title that immediately harks back to the classic Twelve Angry Men, it presents us with the eponymous juror, a man already under pressure as he prepares to become a father for the first time. He has a name – Justin Kemp – and jury service is the last thing he needs but, unable to get out of it, he finds himself selected for a murder trial. Once it starts, he’s horrified to realise that he saw the people involved just before the killing took place and that the man in the dock is very probably innocent. In the jury room, he tries to steer everybody toward a not guilty verdict, while desperately trying to conceal his likely involvement, but the jury decides the other way. And that leaves him with a massive dilemma.

While there’s no sense of a swansong, this is certainly a showcase for Eastwood’s particular style of filmmaking. The strong narrative that moves smoothly between past and present, the unfussy, lean style of filmmaking with an understated tone (no courtroom histrionics here), the complex moral dilemma, and the classy line-up of actors with performances to match – they’re all here, laced with a certain ambiguity that cleverly tempts the audience into playing detective, even though, as we’re reminded, it’s not the jury’s job to crack the case. With their confined spaces and a collection of characters who are mostly strangers, both the courtroom and jury room are tailor-made for drama. And they deliver as always, with Eastwood’s low-key approach ramping up the tension but never the volume.

There are times when the sense of the storyline being there purely to deliver what Eastwood and his writer, Jonathan A Abrams, have to say about the justice system is too strong. We’re constantly reminded that relying on 12 strangers to determine the truth is an imperfect system, but it’s still our best option and it’s hard to avoid the implied comparison with democracy, especially over the weeks to come. And what we’re shown of the process is riddled with holes: one piece of evidence in particular, again, echoes Sidney Lumet’s classic and will have you internally shouting at the screen. It’s certainly nowhere near as slick as Toni Collette’s businesslike hair.

Ever the actors’ director, Eastwood gets great performances from his cast, especially Collette, who is wonderfully steely-eyed as the prosecutor who, with the job of District Attorney in her sights, knows that winning the trial could tip the public vote her way. Nicholas Hoult is increasingly tortured as the juror under pressure from all sides, including his own conscience, while Chris Messina gives an energetic turn as the public defender who knows the odds are stacked against him. Sadly, the narrative demands far too little from J K Simmons as one of the other jurors, so he disappears far too quickly and we miss his screen presence. Back in the 90s, audiences would have flocked to see this type of film and, even if it doesn’t seamlessly fit today’s mould, this is still an engrossing, thought-provoking piece of filmmaking on a number of levels. It deserves the widest audience possible.

★★★ 1/2

In UK cinemas November 1st / Nicholas Hoult, Toni Collette, J.K. Simmons, Zoey Deutch, Kiefer Sutherland, Chris Messina, Amy Aquino / Dir: Clint Eastwood / Warner Brothers / 12A