Court is in session
John Grisham is a very popular author who has entertained millions of readers for years. I know about a dozen people who live and die by him. They are usually Tom Clancy fans as well. So, to say the least, they know drama when they see it because Grisham delivers it without forgiveness to feelings by his reader. The biggest worry that readers usually have when it comes to their beloved novels is that they don’t translate well to the big screen. Grisham and Warner Brothers proves that if you get the right cast and the right writer, you’ll have enough success with translation.
This DVD set includes the following dramas:
The Pelican Brief
The Client
Runaway Jury
A Time to Kill
The Pelican Brief
Julia Roberts (in her younger years, not that she looks old or anything) stars as Darby Shaw, a law student, who works with reporter Gray Grantham (played by the ever cool Denzel Washington) who have potentially broken open the case regarding the death of two Supreme Court Judges. The problem is, the suspects and their associates want to make sure the findings aren’t brought to light, so they are hounded and hunted in this Grisham drama.
It’s a little long-toothed in some areas, but The Pelican Brief doesn’t fail to entertain. I think there are moments in the movie where you do get tense, why wouldn’t you when it comes to a Grisham story, but overall I believe it to be the weakest of the bunch. Again, it still does entertain and Roberts and Washington give really good performances (they were both up and coming at this point in their acting careers), so don’t get me wrong about that. Good story, some decent action-esque moments and a good edition to the entire package.
The Client
The Client is an interesting film that stars Susan Sarandon as attorney Regina Love, who is loving and caring towards the main focus of the film Brad Renfro who plays Mark Sway, an 11-year-old boy who is witness to a mafia suicide and is told, prior to the suicide, where a missing Senator’s body is located. Love tries to protect the boy while Tommy Lee Jones’ character, Roy Foltrigg a federal prosecutor, wants to the information that the boy has. In-between all of this, the mafia is out to put the information in deep in the ground as well as Sway. I’ll stop there.
The fun part of this movie, if you want to consider this fun, is the debate whether one person’s life compared to bringing down an entire mafia is worth the trouble. This is the movie where I really fell in love with Sarandon’s acting ability. She plays a tough lawyer, but caring individual. Before this film, I only knew her from Bull Durham (which yours truly makes his star debut — upper corner of the 3-5 second July fourth scene. I can smell an oscar) and I was impressed with her range in this film.
Now, overall this film is probably my second favorite in this collection. It brings the suspense, the action and the intelligence. It brings all the right elements and I was very satisfied the first time around when I saw this in the theater. Revisiting it, I felt like it was still holding its own. There are a few dead spaces in the storyline, but for the majority of the film there’s more substance than not.
A good one.
Runaway Jury
Here’s an interesting story. Runaway Jury tells the tale of an up and coming lawyer handling the case of a woman who is suing a gun manufacturer for the wrongful death of her husband. Dustin Hoffman plays good lawyer Wendell Rohr, who has good intentions in the case. On the other side of the coin is consultant Rankin Fitch, played by Gene Hackman, who is out to make sure the Jury doesn’t sway towards Rohr’s client by any means necessary. In the middle lies a juror named Nicholas and his girlfriend Marlee who have their own agenda in all of this mess.
I like the intentions put forth, but feel like this is one of those moments where the book has better organizational methods for this story and enough room to tell it properly. Having to juggle three different stories that meet at some crossroads is difficult and the film runs short when it comes to timing to tell the entire story. I love the performances of the actors, though. They did well and quite frankly anything with Gene Hackman in it makes everything better. Too bad he couldn’t help the compressed story.
A Time to Kill
This is the pinnacle of the collection. A Time to Kill is an emotional story about a man whose daughter (young daughter) has been raped by two idiot country boys. Brutally beating her, trying to kill her and their failed attempt creates a tough story right from the get-go. What complicates things is her father, Carl Lee, ends up killing the two guys before they make it to trial. What could have been an open and closed case ends up as Carl Lee on trial for murder. Young attorney, Jake Brigance (Matthew McConaughey), ends up defending Carl Lee and trying to prove that his client was right in his reaction, but wrong with the murder. Carl Lee’s life depends on Brigance’s ability to take down governor candidate Rufus Buckley, who is prosecuting Carl Lee.
Race and intentions are huge in this blockbuster film. Interesting from beginning to end, no dead spaces and a fiery set of cast members who play their roles perfectly. What’s fantastic about this story is that while there is a race card played in the plot points it doesn’t turn out to be black versus white, rather it turns into Carl Lee versus his own true intentions to make sure the sick bastards that raped his daughter rightfully didn’t get away with murdering her innocence. The best part of the film is when McConaughey gives his final speech to the jury. Emotionally riveting for the audience, this film propels how great Grisham novels can be once they’re properly transformed onto the silver screen.
Best film in the set and probably top 20 in my book.
Features left out of the courtroom
While the collection certainly delivers when it comes to movies, it misses when it comes to extra content. You get mostly production notes with commentary only featured on Runaway Jury. Not impressive at all, but the movies certainly overshadow that. You have to forgive them a bit. Now, the movies are just repackaged from their individual DVDs, which is fine in concept, but lacks in certain areas. I had to flip the disc of A Time to Kill. I shouldn’t have to do that in this day and age. When LOTR can fit one of their three and a half hours (maybe more) films on a single disc, something is wrong here. I wasn’t overly impressed about that.