Witness For The Prosecution -- 1957

And again, we come in with a year that has paired movies. 1957 was the year another court play adaptation came out: 12 Angry Men. That one is definitely a smaller scale, but our tendency to have genre films come out in pairs goes back years. This one had no disappointment to offer within its frames, and even ended with a word from the theatre management requesting the audience not to divulge the secret of the ending for the enjoyment of your friends. Far be it from me to deny the request of the 1957 theatre management. This comes as no surprise, really, as the final five minutes of the film contains no less than 3 twists.

The story, itself, is fairly simple. Based on an Agatha Christie play, the film follows the trial of a man accused of killing a rich, old woman who had taken a liking to him. While there appears to be no initial motive, one comes out in that day's paper showing that the woman had recently rewritten her will to bequeath her 80,000 pound estate to the man (and back then, that was a lot of money). Throughout, we get lots of backstory of the man, his wife, and the old woman to show how everything came to pass, but the man maintains his innocence about the killing stating he got home before the murder occurred.

The big question mark is his wife, who says she is repeating what her husband told her to say about when he got home, etc. We learn that under British law, a wife cannot testify against her husband, and the lawyer says that the testimony of a loving wife carries little weight. So what happens? The title character turns out to be the wife who is proven to be married to someone else in Germany, not in love with her supposed husband on trial, and then surprises everyone by telling a completely different story than she told the police -- one that implicates the man in the murder. And that's where I leave you.

The characters are very well developed here, and the relationship between the lawyer and his nurse is nothing short of hilarious. It's a drama by nature, but it doesn't stop at any chance of grabbing a laugh from the audience, and I found myself laughing out loud at regular intervals at the antics and audacity of some of the characters. Even the judge uttered some deadpan lines that were very funny in the situations.

The plot was meticulously constructed and interest was maintained throughout the potentially most boring part of the movie: the trial. Since the characters were setup so well, we just felt like we were watching people we knew go into a hard situation, and we watched their idiosyncrasies play out in this stressful environment. Without the development of the characters, the trial would have been beyond boring, but as it was, it was well done and interesting.

This is a very easy film to watch and very enertaining despite its simplicity. It has some good, well rounded characters with individuality and personality that constantly comes through within its plot. When all truths are revealed in the end, it is both shocking and anticipated, but ultimately satisfying and the only way it could have gone. Very excellent film.