Philadelphia - 15 years later

I saw the advertising on AMC for the 15-year anniversary of "Philadelphia," that modern-day classic starring Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington, which brought the dark persecution suffered by victims of AIDS into the broad daylight of everybody's lives. It sought to teach the common man, the ignorant man, that AIDS was not an illness anyone could catch, not transmitted through ordinary human contact, and that we should not treat AIDS patients like the lepers of biblical times. It actually did more than that -- it made people face the fact of discrimination against gays, in general, in a way that as far as I know, no other movie had done before. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.)

So I thought I'd watch it again. Interestingly, something has happened to me between 1993 and now. (Something relevant to my take on the film.) I've learned a little bit about the law. I worked in a law school, first, then later worked in several law firms, dated a couple of attorneys, and then worked in a big-city courthouse. I've also done a lot of reading: law reviews, legal history essays. It's an area you might say I'm familiar with. So when I saw this film, which is a courtroom drama by genre, I paid some attention to the presentation of the case. I became less interested in the emotional aspects of a dying man's fight against discrimination. In this context, it's a totally different movie.

If you look at it for what it was meant to be (see first paragraph) it has a big emotional impact. For sure. Here's Denzel Washington, shaking a man's hand and then stepping ten feet back after he learns that the man has AIDS. Here's Tom Hanks, trying to read in the public library, but they want to put him away in a private room as if he needs to be quarantined.

However, if you begin paying attention to the actual court case, it becomes an infuriatingly bad movie. If you are trying to follow the arguments being made, you see instantly that they don't work. For instance, the defense attorney, in her cross examination, asks Tom Hanks a series of questions about his sexual encounters in a gay movie theater. What's the relevance in a wrongful termination lawsuit? Objection! When an objection is raised she states that her line of questioning goes to credibility. So, I the viewer take this to mean that she is going to prove he's a liar -- isn't that what you would think? That he can't be trusted? His word is no good? Something along those lines? Yet, she never proves nor disproves anything about whether the man is credible. She never even raises that issue! It makes no sense whatsoever. All she's doing is asking him about his sex life. When did he contract AIDS? Was it in a movie theater? Was it when he had sex with a stranger? Yes, yes, yes, he says (he doesn't deny anything). So for the movie's theme, I get it. People are homophobic. People thought homosexuals deserved to get AIDS because of their "lifestyles." It was ugly, ignorant, prejudiced and wrong to think that way. No one deserves to get AIDS.

OK. Does this line of questioning have emotional impact? Yes. Does it even try to sound like a point is being made, in a legal argument? No. He doesn't lie. She doesn't say he lied. She doesn't show that he lied. She doesn't even try to find out whether he lied about anything. The issue isn't even addressed.

Here's an even more glaring problem. Suppose I am not paying attention to the arguments and I'm willing to ignore the fact that neither of the attorneys is making a case. I mean, what if I had never worked in a law firm or courthouse? I'm just the average viewer now, and I don't pay any attention to the arguments. (Although this would be difficult, considering the entire movie takes place in a courtroom.) Minimally, I as the viewer care about what happens to Tom Hanks. Don't you? All my heartstrings are being pulled. Clearly I want him to win the case; I am pulling for him. So -- how bad is it that, when the movie is over and he wins the case, I can't even tell you why or how he won it?!

Usually, in almost every courtroom drama you'll see, there's a moment when the case turns; something is revealed, either in evidence or in testimony that changes the case and turns it around, usually in favor of the protagonist. Anyone, any viewer, even one with no legal knowledge, can point to the moment. It's the drama of the movie, so it's supposed to work. In "Philadelphia," that moment is skipped over. There is no convincing argument made by either side. All we have is one emotional moment after another, followed by the win, which I guess they figured we were expecting -- so it didn't have to be convincing. What a let-down. Way to treat your viewers like children. "Yay! He won the case! We're happy now, because this is what we knew would happen and it takes away the sting of death at the end! Everybody applaud the success!" Give me a break. I want to know, please tell me (now that I've invested all these hours in this courtroom), how did he manage to win it?

Was it because the partners could see lesions on his face? (There's this gut-wrenching scene where Tom Hanks unbuttons his shirt to reveal the prominence of lesions, viewable by the entire jury.) But we knew all along they could see the lesions, so nothing was proven by that display. In the beginning, the point was conceded that his employers saw the lesions but didn't know what they were. So that wasn't a breakthrough in the case. How dumb do you think I am? You think I've already forgotten the first half hour of the movie?

What I expected was that, at some point in the movie, Denzel Washington was going to uncover some proof that the partners knew about the AIDS. They claimed they didn't know; he had to prove they did in order to prove wrongful termination. He never proved that. So, I was very, very disappointed. And even though I can say, as I did in the first paragraph, that this movie did amazing things for society, when it was released in the early 1990s, it truly had impact because it opened our eyes to persecution -- I can admit that, but I can't say it was a good movie. It just didn't really try. That was the saddest part. Many movies include a legal case, and they also have another agenda, and yet they manage with a little effort, to weave together a story that is reasonable as well as emotional. This one didn't even give us the chance to use our brains. It wanted our hearts and that was all it went after. It didn't even try to put the pieces together in a way that made sense. "Who cares if it doesn't make sense? It made you cry, didn't it?" I hate that.

Twelve Angry Men

"Twelve Angry Men" does exactly what it's supposed to do. An amazing feat for a movie, I say. So often we start out with high expectations and we're disappointed. We balk at a movie that claims it will provide us with a profound experience.

Here, You start out with one juror who believes the boy is innocent and you know he's supposed to convince all the other jurors. They are ready to send the boy to the electric chair. It's the proverbial lone juror. Ay ay ay.

So you know the situation immediately. You know what is supposed to happen. You know that, by the end, all the jurors will be persuaded to change their minds. You know too that, this will have implications beyond the personal, beyond the political. It will teach us something about the quality of humanity.

However, it seems impossible! Both for Henry Fonda and for the movie. How can one man persuade all these other men (who are not just angry, but sweaty, impatient, bullying, rude, and exhausted, who have people to see and places to go) to change their position on something so serious as a murder? This is an old-fashioned, deeply serious, moral movie. Yet how can one little movie teach us something truly profound about the humanity in all of us? Wow. Even as I write the words, it sounds like too much to take. "Give me a break!" I might say. Or "Don't give me that!" Sounds overbearing, over-profound, too much for this movie to shoulder.

Yet, it succeeds 100% and there isn't an overblown moment in the whole darn thing. It is one of those extremely rare things - the perfect movie.

Takes you for a ride, entertains you, lets you coast while it does all the work (another rare feat for a movie, at least these days), keeps you guessing, you're in suspense - you think you can predict it but you can't, keeps you emotionally involved - you actually care about each and every character! - and keeps you at the center of the issue, never leaves you bored or yawning, it makes you laugh, makes you think, makes you re-evaluate your own certainty about whether certainty is possible. Makes you re-evaluate what it means to be a human being, what is at the heart of all of us. And lets you do all this without getting irritated with yourself. What a treat.

The Paper Chase

I used to like this movie, when I saw it the first time. Cute flick about a cute boy who's on his way to becoming a lawyer. Lots of good classroom scenes.

I don't know what I thought it was "about," except there's a guy struggling in law school (Harvard no less) and he's got a sorta-romantic subplot which is sorta interesting.

Recently I watched it again and I decided, it's political. And I don't like the political statement it makes. And furthermore! I don't think it makes any sense. Like many liberal "statements" this one is corny and rings false. Do you really think that a Harvard law student wouldn't care about his grades at the end of the year? Just because his teacher didn't know his name?

Throughout the movie there's this repeated mantra - "It's all about the grades." Then there's a scene where the pretty, but frankly boring, romantic interest tells the boy that he's on a paper chase (note the lack of subtlety). She compares attaining a law degree to attaining a driver's license and an insurance policy. Hm. Let's think about that.

And the boy, struggling through law school -- Harvard law school -- is supposed to swallow that and decide (in a sudden moment of gushing realization when his teacher doesn't remember his name) that suddenly his grades don't matter? He actually makes a paper airplane out of them and sends them out flying over the ocean. It doesn't come any cornier than this.

Great performance by John Houseman, though.