Dir:
David Dobkin
With: Robert Duvall, Robert Downey Jr, Vera Farmiga
Runtime: 141 minutes
JUSTICE is meant to be blind, the better to weigh the evidence before her and decide on the guilt or innocence of the accused. It is hard, however, not to take notice of the baubles and celebrity which adorn David Dobkin's drama. Through star power alone, The Judge looks as if it ought to walk free from critics' court without a stain on its character. How appearances deceive.
Within this cast one will certainly find the likes of Robert Duvall, Robert Downey Junior, Vera Farmiga and Billy Bob Thornton, each one either an A or a B plus lister, the kind of safe and steady types that it is usually worth taking a punt on. Yet despite the collective wattage of the cast there is a hollowness about this drama which no amount of flash dialogue or attempts at seriousness can disguise.
The judge of the title is Joseph Palmer (Robert Duvall), a man who has lived all his small town life according to the law, believing in its truth and majesty. His son, Hank (Robert Downey Jr), has followed him into the profession, but Hank is a different breed of lawyer. Now living in LA, what truly matters to Hank is not the guilt or innocence of his clients but whether they can afford his fees.
When first we meet Hank he is about to do what he does best - to wit, make a monkey of the law. But just before swinging into action he receives a call to say that his mother has died. Now he must go home, to the father who is a stranger to him, and the community he left a long time ago. As if all that wasn't enough to put a crumple in his designer suit, dad becomes involved in a hit-and-run on the day of the funeral, the victim a miscreant to whom he gave a chance only to have that faith thrown back at him. And just who is the judge to call when he is in need of a lawyer but his own legal eagle son?
So this tale directed by Dobkin (The Change Up, Wedding Crashers, Fred Claus) unfolds. Except it is not quite that simple. The Judge is not content to be merely a courtroom drama. It would like a few more things taken into consideration, like the fact it has Duvall and Downey Jr on board and, come what may, they are going to be given the time and space to do a bit of heavy lifting on the acting front. This entails a lot of shouting as the two clash and regroup, clash and regroup. There is one particular scene which practically screams how brave and grown up and willing to push boundaries everyone is prepared to be. Sometimes such temptations should be resisted.
Duvall is as polished as ever as the crusty old gent who knows where he stands in life and is not going to budge for anyone, especially not his flash son. Vera Farmiga is wasted as an old girlfriend of Hank's, while Billy Bob Thornton hardly breaks sweat as a prosecuting lawyer. Downey Jr, meanwhile, is perhaps the most disappointing. Known for his fast-talking ways in other movies, he gives more of the same here. It is as if he never left the television series, Ally McBeal, in which he also played, you've guessed it, a wisecracking lawyer with a mile-a-minute mouth.
Such is the amount of material Dobkin tries to cram in, the film overstays its welcome, and whatever tension is there when proceedings in the courtroom finally begin is lost as the minutes limp by.
And still the picture plods onwards and downwards.
In conclusion, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, The Judge is a perfect example of a film that promises much, but does not deliver. There is, admittedly, some entertainment to be had from watching the likes of Duvall and Downey Jr trade acting blows, but it is not enough to rescue the picture from predictability.
Of that it is guilty as charged.
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