We can now add Hoffman vs Hackman to our list of all-time grand confrontations. The big-screen behemoths square up in Runaway Jury, Gary Fleder's entertaining, slick and pacy courtroom drama based on the novel by John Grisham.
In Grisham's book, the villain is an evil tobacco corporation; the movie, though, deals with gun crime. Hoffman is a lawyer armed with experience, conviction, and intentionally mustard-stained ties whose client, widowed when her husband was killed in a shootout at work, is suing the gun manufacturers. Hackman is a Machiavellian behind-the-scenes jury manipulation expert hired by evil gun corporations to control the jury through surveillance, blackmail, and exceptionally mobile eyebrows. They're both playing roles they've done dozens of times, and it shows in the complete ease with which they straddle their characters. The coherent, sharp sequence when they actually select the jury is great viewing.
But there are other players manipulating the manipulators—Cusack, who excels as a charming, scheming juror working from the inside, and Weisz, his driven, gutsy sidekick, are a mysterious young couple with an agenda of their own who offer both Hackman and Hoffman a chance to buy a verdict for a cool $10 million. The action is transferred from the usual prosecution/defence courtroom debate to what's happening to the motley group of confused jurors as this diverse array of puppeteers pull their strings.
Cynical, self-mocking and witty (trials are too important to be decided by juries, says Hackman at one stage), Runaway Jury takes a winning recipe (add star cast to Grisham novel, stick in blender) and presents a well-cooked, cerebral flick, with excellent editing, a tight script and an edgy, atmospheric soundtrack. The end features a well-executed if predictable twist involving family photographs, high school gun massacres and wire transfers to the Cayman islands.
Runaway Jury is more than worth a watch, but should have stuck to jury psychology and left gun control to Michael Moore. We should all be tired of paeans to the American legal system's essential greatness and the plot, however enjoyable, is sometimes implausible.
US Top 5
1. Dawn of the Dead
2. The Passion of the Christ
3. Taking Lives
4. Starsky &Hutch
5. Secret Window
INDIAN Top 5
1. Munnabhai MBBS
2. Ab Tak Chappan
3. Khakee
4. Kismat
5. Maqbool
Courtesy: Film Information
