When Warner Bros. quietly dropped Clint Eastwood‘s latest film into just a handful of U.S. theaters last month, plenty of people took notice. Despite rolling “Juror #2” out at Los Angeles’ AFI FEST — where our own critic Christian Zilko slapped a “Critic’s Pick” designation on it and hailed it as “one of the best studio films of 2024” — the worryingly anti-filmmaker studio did little else in the way of supporting this original legal thriller from one of our most accomplished living filmmakers.
The film was released in less than three dozen U.S. cities during its first week of release, and though a few more were added for its second week, finding screenings in even major metropolitan areas has proven tough for Eastwood fans. It really shouldn’t be: The film is indeed one of the best studio efforts of the year, the kind of adult-skewing fare smart cinephiles remain hungry for, filled with great acting, big twists, and smart writing that keeps audiences engaged for its full (and blessedly under two hours) running time.
Just how big and real is this “Juror #2” buzz? On a blustery Monday evening in Manhattan, three IndieWire editors paid out of their own pockets to see the film at the AMC Lincoln Square with a surprisingly packed and enthusiastic crowd. The final verdict? Read ahead to see Editorial Director Kate Erbland, TV head Erin Strecker, and film head Ryan Lattanzio hash out what’s so appealing about the film, and offer their official sentencing as to its cinematic value.
Kate Erbland: I don’t say this with any (murderous!) malice, but I can only have so many more conversations with colleagues, talent, and regular ol’ film fans about the distinct lack of smart, adult-centric programming at the box office before I go nuts and do something that might land me in county lockup. The “four-quadrant film” may have spurned some massive box office bucks in recent years, but making the edict that films need to appeal to everybody to get studio backing has been the death knell for actual creativity and original work.
“Juror #2” is smart and twisty and just good fun to watch, bursting with great performances (and not just from stars like Nicholas Hoult and Toni Collette, but a delightful assortment of supporting performers), gasp-worthy revelations, and a very clear belief that its audience wants to be engaged and not talked down to. It doesn’t spoon-feed plot points, dares to end with a major question, and refuses to answer my primary query (are Collette and Chris Messina’s dueling lawyers doin’ it or what?). I felt invigorated and interested while watching it, excited to see where it was going, and reminded of what it was like when these kinds of films were the norm at the box office.
“Juror #2” is, in the simplest possible terms, a very good movie, and it made me believe it’s still possible to make those — and extremely necessary to support them when they are made.
Verdict: It’s good! Go see it!
Erin Strecker: “Juror #2” is a perfect movie for adults, and it’s an especially perfect movie for adults who want to think about literally anything else — gestures ~wildly~ at world — for two hours without easy access to doomscrolling. Compelling, thought-provoking, and with enough genuinely surprising reveals that elicited both appreciative gasps as well as loud chuckles at a few of the more out-there twists, it is completely bananas that Warner Bros. is doing just about everything it can to make sure you can’t see this movie.
In addition to Collette and Messina’s dueling lawyers, for my money, J.K. Simmons as a fellow juror with a secret is one of the best parts. The film is a treasure trove of character actors given the space to monologue! Wrestle with ethics! Yell at a fellow member of the court system! and they all dive into the story with relish. As someone whose life-long dream is to serve on a jury (not successful yet, but one day!), I would have watched five to six hours of the 12 angry men and women argue about mercy and prejudices. (Though speaking of prejudices, there were a few groaner lines delivered in that deliberation room from a script by Jonathan Abrams that could have used another pass.)
Verdict: See this movie now! And then watch again with your parents or teens over the holidays on Max; it’s an easy crowdpleaser.
Ryan Lattanzio: The political life of Clint Eastwood (a registered Libertarian as of 2009) has been the subject of much scrutiny and inspired a kind of retroactive and miscalculated reappraisal of his past oeuvre. His recent films, like “Sully” and “Richard Jewell,” seem to support the thesis that Eastwood — still kicking at 94 where many of his peers are in the winter of their lives or gone — is primarily interested only in good men whose eventually triumphant nobility is complicated and questioned by the shifting tides of the present world. That moral character ought to prevail cinematically over trendier, more ironic approaches to manhood or American-ness in the 21st century. In other words, in this climate? He makes the sort of movie that seems to snarkier audiences to be out of fashion.
But those audiences not allergic to nuance will find a Clint Eastwood in “Juror #2” at his most politically cynical (and even, at his age, shruggingly this-is-no-country-for-old-men indifferent) best. Here, he seems to have lost hope in the justice system to uplift moral character at all or to punish its opposing forces. As an incumbent District Attorney and the prosecutor of an alleged murder that juror Nicholas Hoult’s Justin Kemp may actually be responsible for, Toni Collette emerges at this film’s final chilling frame as the most Eastwood-ian hero of the picture. Albeit one in a cracked 21st-century lens that’s a far cry from his bronco billys or pale riders. Here, she’s trying to do the quote-unquote right thing but up against all obstacles in the process that make doing so futile, short-circuiting moral compasses in the process.
All of that aside, “Juror #2” is a superbly made and even relaxed affair, with an unfussy Eastwood harking back not to just to the legal thrillers of the ’80s and ’90s we dearly miss but to noir and even Hitchcock. The shocks and gasps in the audience at unexpected moments — where a close-up on a picture frame or a note attached to a bouquet of flowers — reminded me of the best of the Master of the Suspense. In her New York Times review, Manohla Dargis (albeit giving a Critics’ Pick imprimatur) complained that the visuals in “Juror #2” (Yves Bélanger is DP) were merely serviceable or just “fine.” I disagree. A cut to a rock being dropped in the waters that fill the very creekbed a woman was left to die in is one of those hauntingly resonant Eastwood moments that only hits you later.
Verdict: Go into “Juror #2” for the gripping story, but stay for the film’s most compelling case for its greatness — and further indictment of David Zaslav of his treatment of a filmmaker who has done tremendous work for Warner Bros. for decades: its masterly craftsmanship.
A Warner Bros. release, “Juror #2” is in (some) theaters (for) now.
