From an article by Will Pavia in The Times:
I love courtroom dramas, and this has long been my favourite. In US legal circles it has apparently been voted the third best film courtroom drama of all time, after Twelve Angry Men and To Kill a Mockingbird. When Jonathan Lynn started work on the film 'he was convinced that it would be funnier if it “got the process exactly right”. It tells the tale of two New Yorkers travelling in Alabama who are wrongly arrested for murder. They summon their cousin Vinny, a Brooklyn attorney who has passed the bar at the sixth attempt and who turns up in court in a crimson suit from a second-hand shop because his own is stuck at the dry cleaner’s.'
Marisa Tomei
plays his fiancée with a Brooklyn accent you could cut corn with - she won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance. Every character, the setting, everything about this film is note-perfect. I realised I hadn't seen it for a while, sent for the DVD, and watched it a couple of nights ago. Pure gold. Comedy, yet deadly serious, as the local jail has an electric chair (with dodgy electricity supply) to which the lads will be sent if Vinny fails. Everyone - judge, prosecuting attorney, defendants - is delighted with the outcome - a humane and ultimately moving tale, with a stonking soundtrack.
In a recent ruling on protests in courtrooms, Judge Janice Rogers Brown of the United States Court of Appeals in Washington quoted a wealth of case law and an influential text book co-authored by Antonin Scalia, the late Supreme Court justice.
Then, as she wound to a conclusion, Judge Brown reached for another work now widely cited by American legal scholars: the film My Cousin Vinny.
The 1992 comedy, starring Joe Pesci and directed by Jonathan Lynn, the Briton who was one of the creators of Yes Minister, is now regarded as one of the most brilliant and telling portrayals of the American legal system.
Law school professors use clips of the film in the classroom. Judge Joseph Anderson Jr, from South Carolina, recently published a paper titled Ten Things Every Trial Lawyer Could Learn From Vincent LaGuardia Gambini, the film’s lead character, and many a dogged defence attorney cites it as an inspiration. Yesterday, on the 25th anniversary of its release, Justice Don Willett of the Texas Supreme Court called it “one of the best legal films of all time” on his Twitter page.
Then, as she wound to a conclusion, Judge Brown reached for another work now widely cited by American legal scholars: the film My Cousin Vinny.
The 1992 comedy, starring Joe Pesci and directed by Jonathan Lynn, the Briton who was one of the creators of Yes Minister, is now regarded as one of the most brilliant and telling portrayals of the American legal system.
Law school professors use clips of the film in the classroom. Judge Joseph Anderson Jr, from South Carolina, recently published a paper titled Ten Things Every Trial Lawyer Could Learn From Vincent LaGuardia Gambini, the film’s lead character, and many a dogged defence attorney cites it as an inspiration. Yesterday, on the 25th anniversary of its release, Justice Don Willett of the Texas Supreme Court called it “one of the best legal films of all time” on his Twitter page.
Marisa Tomei
plays his fiancée with a Brooklyn accent you could cut corn with - she won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance. Every character, the setting, everything about this film is note-perfect. I realised I hadn't seen it for a while, sent for the DVD, and watched it a couple of nights ago. Pure gold. Comedy, yet deadly serious, as the local jail has an electric chair (with dodgy electricity supply) to which the lads will be sent if Vinny fails. Everyone - judge, prosecuting attorney, defendants - is delighted with the outcome - a humane and ultimately moving tale, with a stonking soundtrack.
- and Fred Gwynne as the judge, too.
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