“The Verdict” starring Paul Newman is an American movie produced in 1982. The movie is about an alcoholic lawyer who engages in a medical malpractice case for his gains. However, he discovers that he is doing the right thing along the way.
In this movie, Mr. Newman acts like an alcoholic who breaks the law and disregards ethical standards to prove that Doctors at a Roman Catholic hospital gave the wrong diagnosis and treatment for a healthy but otherwise pregnant woman. As a result, the woman experiences brain damage and is rendered invalid. Eventually, the woman is forced to spend the rest of her life in hospital, supported by a life-support machine. Her relatives have hired Mr. Newman to represent them.
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Newman has had his share of problems over the years but tries to use this case to salvage his self-esteem. He has previously lost his job, experienced a messy divorce and had a disbarment hearing. All of these problems combined are the causes of his alcoholism problem. As an attorney, he only makes occasional guest appearances and spends the rest of his day playing games and drinking alcohol.
The most remarkable issue about this movie is how Newman breaks into the nurses’ mailbox to intercept a letter and a direct infringement of the US federal laws. Moreover, he declines a pre-trial settlement offer from the Catholic Church without consulting his clients. Again, this is an outright infringement of the lawyers’ ethical code. In fact, this transgression can cause any lawyer to be disbarred. However, the villains’ sins are much bigger than these. Therefore, Newman’s sins are dwarfed by the villains’ sins. In this case, the villains are the judges, some of whom are cahoots with the defense and take steps within the court to destroy the plaintiff’s case.
Unfortunately, doctors are also involved in altering medical records. Further, a team of lawyers collaborate with witnesses and bribe some of them to disappear on the eve of the trial case. These lawyers even place a one-sided story in the media. As interpreted by the judges and the defense, the law itself is depicted as unfair when it is applied to keep judges from considering the proof of the doctors’ misdeeds.
The movie illustrates a serious flaw in the justice system. The most significant thing the movie gets right is that about the biased judges. Moreover, we see the judges make rulings which are not expected or which depict their attitudes or views. This happens in our real life courts all the time as lawyers tend to analyze cases together with the judges.
Overall, “The Verdict” highlights how our legal system is flawed. As a whole, jurors should try to be fair-minded in their verdicts. The movie had so much impression on them because it is not just a movie, like any other. Jurors are losing their intelligence.
