12 Angry Men
...on CBS on 20 September, the film was nominated for Academy Awards in the categories of Best Director, Best Picture and Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium. In all of these categories, the film was eclipsed by The Bridge on the River Kwai, which won seven Academy Awards that year. At the Berlin International Film Festival, the film won the Golden Bear Award. The cinematographer, Boris Kaufman, who hailed from Europe and collaborated with French film director Jean Vigo on Zéro de conduite (1933) and L'Atalante (1934), was a previous Academy Award winner for his work in On the Waterfront (1954), but was not nominated in 1957. Lumet and Kaufman went on to collaborate successfully in The Fugitive Kind (1959), Long Day's Journey into Night (1962), and The Pawnbroker (1964). Fonda, who had received his first Oscar nomination for Best Actor The Grapes of Wrath (1940), was not nominated for his acting. (But as producer, he would have received the Oscar had the film won the Best Picture award).
Lumet, whose prior directorial credits included dramas for television productions such as the Alcoa Hour and Studio One, was recruited by Fonda and Rose to direct Rose's teleplay for the big screen. 12 Angry Men was, therefore, Lumet's first feature film, and for Fonda and Rose, who co-produced the film (Fonda later stated that he would never again produce a movie), it was their first and only roles as film producers. Although 12 Angry Men has garnered critical acclaim and is viewed as a "classic" today, at the time of its release the advent of color and wide-screen productions contributed to its disappointing box office performance.
When it was released, A. H. Weiler reviewed the film for The New York Times. "It makes for taut, absorbing, and compelling drama that reaches far beyond the close confines of its jury room...
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