Anatomy of a Murder

Over the next few weeks I will undertake my third annual retrospective on the Best Picture Oscar nominees from fifty years ago, plus other major films from that year. I got a start on it with my articles on The 400 Blows and North by Northwest, neither of which were nominated (also left out was Some Like It Hot). One of the nominees instead was the moderately entertaining but ultimately disposable courtroom-drama Anatomy of a Murder.

Directed by Otto Preminger, who spent much of the 1950s daring the production code. Anatomy of a Murder was a sensation of its time, as it frankly discusses rape. It was banned in Chicago, of all places (the Windy City has a fairly bawdy history) and played to packed houses where it wasn't banned, presumably for the shock value of seeing the esteemed James Stewart say things like "sperm" and "sexual climax."

Stewart, in full aw-shucks mode, is a small-town attorney in Michigan's upper peninsula. He was once the district attorney, but lost re-election and as the film begins fritters his time away by fishing, playing his jazz records, and palling with his dipsomaniacal partner, Arthur O'Connell. He is recommended to a young woman, Lee Remick, who begs him to take the case of her husband, Ben Gazzara, an army lieutenant who plugged a tavern-owner five times with a Luger after the deceased raped his wife. Stewart, despite not taking a liking to Gazzara, agrees to take the case, and he and O'Connell cook up a temporary insanity defense.

The prosecuting team includes George C. Scott as a big-city D.A. flown in from the state capital. He's a mechanical courtroom killer, contrasting with Stewart's homespun theatrics. There are a few mild turns in the case, involving the manager of the tavern (played by Kathryn Grant, who would one day be Mrs. Bing Crosby), but ultimately Scott is foiled by the old bugaboo--never ask a witness a question you don't know the answer to.

Viewed today, Anatomy of a Murder is tamer than a typical episode of Law and Order: SVU--several minutes are spent in titillation over the word "panties." The direction is frequently clumsy, and there isn't much of a mystery at the heart of the story. Stewart acts as if shot out of a cannon--would any other actor make more of the phrase "pitching woo?" It's interesting to see him, a relic of old Hollywood, in scenes with Gazzara, who would go on to star in the films of John Cassavetes, who would re-write the rules of American filmmaking.

Remick replaced Lana Turner, who quit over differences with the hot-headed Preminger. Also in the cast were Eve Arden, playing her usual role of the no-nonsense career woman. Several performers who are recognizable from television dot the cast: Orson Bean, Howard McNear (Floyd the Barber from The Andy Griffith Show--he's the one talking about sperm), and Joseph Kearns, the original Mr. Wilson from Dennis the Menace. An interesting appearance is made by Joseph N. Welch as the judge. Welch is an American hero, the attorney who upbraided Senator Joseph McCarthy by asking him, "At long last, have you left no sense of decency?" and for all intents and purposes ended McCarthyism. His performance is amateurish but endearing.

The film is highly regarded by lawyers, many of whom have called it the best trial movie ever made. That may be true, from a legal perspective, but I prefer Witness for the Prosecution or The Verdict. I think the film doesn't live up to the excitement generated by its opening credit sequence, designed by Saul Bass in his typical paper cut-out style, and the score, one of the first to use jazz, composed by Duke Ellington (who also makes a cameo appearance).