Directed by Otto Preminger • 1959 • United States
Starring James Stewart, Lee Remick, Ben Gazzara
A virtuoso James Stewart plays a small-town Michigan lawyer who takes on a difficult case: the defense of a young army lieutenant (Ben Gazzara) accused of murdering a local tavern owner who he believes raped his wife (Lee Remick). This gripping envelope-pusher, the most popular film by Hollywood provocateur Otto Preminger, was groundbreaking for the frankness of its discussion of sex—but more than anything else, it is a striking depiction of the power of words. Featuring an outstanding supporting cast—with a young George C. Scott as a fiery prosecutor and the legendary attorney Joseph N. Welch as the judge—and an influential score by Duke Ellington, ANATOMY OF A MURDER is an American movie landmark, nominated for seven Oscars, including best picture.
Up Next in Courtroom Dramas
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The Verdict
Directed by Sidney Lumet • 1982 • United States
Starring Paul Newman, Charlotte Rampling, Jack WardenTwenty-five years after making his feature debut with the classic legal drama 12 ANGRY MEN, director Sidney Lumet returned to the courtroom with this gripping portrait of a man’s quest for redem...
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Runaway Jury
Directed by Gary Fleder • 2003 • United States
Starring John Cusack, Gene Hackman, Dustin HoffmanOne of the best film adaptations of a John Grisham novel, this gripping legal thriller pits Dustin Hoffman and Gene Hackman against each other as, respectively, an upstanding Southern lawyer and th...
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Inherit the Wind
Directed by Stanley Kramer • 1960 • United States
Starring Spencer Tracy, Fredric March, Gene KellyOne of the twentieth century’s most spectacular trials—the 1925 Scopes “Monkey” Trial, which pitted the theory of evolution against creationism in a battle over intellectual freedom—is vividly dra...
