Discover
-
Joe King
Costume Design -
Ernest Gold
Original Music Composer -
Stanley Kramer
Producer -
George Milo
Set Decoration -
Abby Mann
Screenplay -
Jean Louis
Costume Design -
Ernest Laszlo
Director of Photography -
Marshall Schlom
Script Supervisor
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CinemaSerf 4/20/2023 1:58:51PM
Spencer Tracy is the presiding judge at the fictitious trial of some of the most evil Nazis to have survived the end of WWII. Chief amongst them is the formidable former jurist "Dr. Ernst Janning" (Burt Lancaster). Richard Widmark is tasked with leading the prosecution; Maximilian Schell as their defender. Make no mistake, this is no standard courtroom melodrama. The performances from all - especially a sensitive and measured Tracy who tries, despite every sense of humanity within himself pulling him otherwise - to remain as impartial and fair in the face of the evidence of brutality presented to him and his fellow judges. There are a couple of wonderful cameo performances from victims of the alleged abuses - notably Judy Garland and Monty Clift with Marlene Dietrich as the widow of a former Nazi general who seems to be in some sort of a daze of denial (we are never quite certain what she did/didn't know). The story challenges the very basis of an independent judiciary and the principles of blind obedience motivated by pure evil, zeal or fear. The use, only once, of actual British footage from a liberated concentration camp is heart-rending and sickening in equal measure. A real must see.
William Shatner
Harrison ByersHerman Hack
Concert Attendee (uncredited)Hans Moebus
Assistant Defense Attorney (uncredited)Burt Lancaster
Ernst JanningJack Stoney
Courtroom Spectator (uncredited)Ben Wright
HalbestadtEdward Binns
Senator BurketteEd Nelson
Captain at Nightclub Announcing Call-up of Officers (uncredited)