Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.5

Find Me Guilty Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 13, 2013

Is it wrong to root for the bad guys? That’s been a salient question from the earliest days of cinema, when a rogue’s gallery of lovable rascals often turned the tables, if ever so slightly, on the traditional “hero” versus “villain” scenario. As film matured and studios like Warner Brothers exploited gangster films, while the public was obviously supposed to be rooting for the “G-men” or other police, there’s a sneaking suspicion that at least a few were on Jimmy Cagney’s or Edward G. Robinson’s side, albeit perhaps secretly. That whole question arose again in a big way with a much later “gangster” film, Arthur Penn’s iconic Bonnie and Clyde, which was lambasted at the time of its release for “glorifying violence”, but which made the frankly low life Barrow Gang the object of quite a bit of adulation. When seeing actors as charismatic as Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway sharing the screen with lawman Denver Pyle, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who’s going to win the audience’s heart. It’s interesting to note that back in the thirties when Warner was really churning out gangster films right and left, once the Motion Picture Code kicked in the films were required to show justice prevailing, which often meant the death of the “hero rascal” at the end of the film. That same gambit of course was offered in extremis in Bonnie and Clyde, one of the few elements of that film that actually resembled the reality of the real robbers’ lives (and deaths). But in the decades since Bonnie and Clyde blasted away at conventional morés, filmmakers have had significantly more latitude in portraying bad guys who never really receive their comeuppance. And at least a few of these films have had the temerity to paint their focal subjects as, well, not that bad, all things considered, despite the fact that some of these characters are involved in any number of criminal activities. Such a film is Sidney Lumet’s interesting if flawed 2006 “ripped from the headlines” courtroom drama Find Me Guilty, based on an extremely high profile RICO case brought by the government against the Lucchese crime family in New Jersey. Among the government’s prosecutors was a young man named Rudolf Giuliani (who knew the future “America’s Mayor” once had hair?), who at that time worked in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.

The “ripped from the headlines” description is actually apt for a couple of reasons. The film’s dialogue is culled largely from the actual court transcripts, but there are a number of vets from Dick Wolf’s Law and Order franchise on hand as well, including Linus Roache as federal prosecutor Sean Kierney and Annabella Sciorra as Bella, the ex-wife of the focal goodfella of the piece, Jackie DiNorscio (Vin Diesel). (Aleksa Palladino, who plays the DiNorscios’ daughter, guest starred on a couple of different Law and Order franchise episodes.) And while the film is largely made up of more or less true events, some characters have evidently been fictionalized, including Kierney and a defense attorney played by Peter Dinklage, at least insofar as I’ve been able to surmise from the kind of spotty material about the case available on the internet.

Director (and co-writer) Sidney Lumet was certainly no stranger to courtroom set films by the time he made Find Me Guilty in 2006. He had already helmed some of the most widely lauded offerings in the genre, including 12 Angry Men and The Verdict. Lumet made the perhaps risky decision to base most of the court drama on actual verbiage used during the real life trial, but the film is actually labored for entirely different reasons. While we do get hints of the back story of Jackie and his fellow “goombahs” (to quote Roache’s character), we don’t really get enough to give us appropriate context. That’s especially true with regard to Jackie’s own cousin Tony Campagna (Raul Esparza), a seriously disturbed junkie who shoots Jackie (repeatedly) in the disturbing scene which opens the film.

Without that context, the long and drawn out courtroom drama tends to play somewhat in a vacuum. The actual trial lasted just shy of two years (it’s still the longest criminal trial on record in the United States), and some might feel that Lumet’s film is only slightly shorter. We get glimpses of legal wrangling, but the bulk of this majority of Find Me Guilty is given over to Jackie’s courtroom shenanigans, as he decides to represent himself and then turns the courtroom into his own performance arena, delivering punchlines and other commentary that do not sit well with the cadre of high profile defense attorneys, the other goodfellas on trial, and most importantly, Judge Finestein (Ron Silver).

The film is a showcase for Vin Diesel, and he does a creditable job creating a believable character who is one part ruthless criminal, one part nightclub comedian wannabe. Diesel’s performance ignites the film and energizes it beyond some of its more lethargic tendencies, especially as the testimony drones on and on and Jackie finds himself a very small David up against several rather large Goliaths. Roache is also superb as a kind of oily prosecutor, one whose increasing desperation makes his chase of Jackie a very personal feeling confrontation. The supporting cast is largely excellent as well, though they’re forced to create characters out of mere moments a lot of the time, once again the same context problem that this film can’t really completely escape.

Even without context, there’s a perhaps more pressing problem afflicting Find Me Guilty, namely that aforementioned quality of rooting for the bad guys. There’s absolutely no question that Jackie and all of his cohorts are mobsters, and even though Jackie is an undeniably lovable mobster, he’s been involved in all sorts of nefarious activity. He may do a bang up job protesting that he's a "gagster" not a gangster (and it isn’t spoiling much to reveal that he—and maybe even his friends—get off scot free), but as any judge will tell you, a finding of not guilty does not equate with being innocent.

Find Me Guilty Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Find Me Guilty is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Fox with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Lumet and his cinematographer Ron Fortunato frankly don't have a lot to work with in terms of source material for an eye popping visual experience. Almost all of this film takes place within the drab brown confines of a crowded New York courtroom, and as such there's simply not much of a varied palette or depth of field that can be exploited. That said, this high definition presentation offers very pleasing fine detail, and the film tends to feature close-ups quite a bit of the time, which helps deliver some decently sharp imagery. There are some minor contrast issues which work toward the film's detriment, less so in the courtroom scenes than in the dank prison sequences where Jackie is confined. As with most of the recent glut of Fox catalog releases, there doesn't appear to have been any egregious digital tweaking of any kind done, and so this transfer retains a natural appearance.

Find Me Guilty Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Find Me Guilty features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that, somewhat similarly to the drab palette and the image quality, doesn't have a lot to work with. While there's some good surround activity when raucous activity breaks out in the courtroom, as well as in some of the noisy elements within the prison, the bulk of this film is very front heavy, with long stretches of dialogue that are presented with excellent fidelity but within a very narrow soundfield. The film is notable in one sonic regard: it features a rare film score by Jonathan Tunick, who is better known as the orchestrator for many Stephen Sondheim Broadway musicals (as well as a ton of other musicals). Tunick's score, as well as some good source cues ("When You're Smilin'" is a recurring motif) do spill into the surrounds.

Find Me Guilty Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• A Conversation with Sidney Lumet (480i; 4:36) features several short snippets with Lumet discussing the film.


• Trailers/TV Spots include:

  Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2:25)

  TV Spot #1 (480i; 00:32)

  TV Spot #2 (480i; 00:32)

  TV Spot #3 (480i; 00:32)

Find Me Guilty Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Find Me Guilty has a lot going for it, including a surprisingly nuanced performance by Diesel and some good supporting turns by a high profile cast, but it has a hard time overcoming a certain lethargy at its core as well as a screenplay that gives us a rogues gallery without any background information. Roache's character just seems petulant, when he really should seem like a man on a noble mission, but that's part and parcel of Lumet's perhaps questionable decision to side with the "bad guys". Diesel fans may well want to check this film out, as it's certainly an unusual entry in the actor's oeuvre, but Lumet fans might want to stick with 12 Angry Men.