Review of Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) by Arth J — 21 Sep 2017

Judgment at Nuremberg is a masterclass in acting. There are so many strong performances here that singling out individuals could take paragraphs. I felt for each character and saw their point of view because they were all portrayed as realistic people with genuine motivations. While many of the German characters were played by American actors, I liked how they made the transition to English and just asked you to accept it without a lot of explanation. We get to experience the entire trial through the eyes of Spencer Tracy who is the chief judge presiding over the case. He takes in all the testimony as well as a lot of additional information he gathers from the people around him during the days of the trial. This allows us to walk through these events along with him.

The brilliance of the way Judgment at Nuremberg is structured is the fact that it lays out the case so you can see some validity to the argument of the defense. It?s not easy when he?s defending Nazis, but Maximilian Schell makes an impassioned plea that can almost sway the audience to mercy at least. They also use this film to show the political state of the world at that time, and the fact that there were legitimate reasons many people wanted these men to be found not guilty. It?s a well-crafted film because it does all of this but it also forces the audience to view the horrible realities of the Holocaust. These scenes are awful, and made more uncomfortable because they used real footage of what actually happened in the concentration camps.

I think what surprised me the most about Judgment at Nuremberg was that I never felt the length of the film. Ordinarily movies that are this long start to drag for me, but not this one. It flowed nicely and I never once lost interest. In fact, it strangely felt like they could have done more. This is so fascinating, and the moral questions it raises are so thought-provoking, I just want it investigated further. There was something about the end that felt abrupt and unsatisfying, almost as if the film ran out of gas. Perhaps it was the fact that I knew what the verdict would be since way back when I was in a history class. I anticipated the end, but I still think there could have been a more unique way to wrap things up. That being said, Judgment at Nuremberg is a strong film and it told a story that needed to be told, at just the right time for people to learn from it.