Clint Eastwood
Giurato numero 2

That among the actors there were also two children of artists I only discovered after watching the film. The first is 31-year-old Francesca Ruth Fisher-Eastwood, daughter of Clinton Eastwood Jr. (who, for the record, had already acted at the age of 6 in one of her father's films, and also at 21 in the musical “Jersey Boys“, also directed by Clint), who appears here in very few but essential scenes (being one of the parties involved for which the trial, that runs throughout the entire film, is conducted). The second is Kiefer William Frederick Dempsey George Rufus Sutherland, son of the excellent Donald McNichol Sutherland (RIP), who passed away this August. He also appears here in very few but emblematic scenes. I didn't recognize him immediately also because I had literally lost sight of him since 1993 when he played Athos in “The Three Musketeers”, and yes, since then he's continued acting in at least around forty films, but that's another story.

This is one of the few films where Eastwood does not appear as an actor, but his presence is felt through the themes addressed and the way he handles them. There is a narrative trademark characteristic of his, and it is evident in not burdening the American procedural themes, which become quite fluid and sharp under his direction.

The themes diversify and each person internalizes them, also from their own subjective ability as well as that of the director. Obviously, it's about “Justice” or, ehm, injustice, but also about good and evil, the a priori hatred towards a human being who is unknown, the necessity of putting the truth before everything as well as concealing it to protect oneself from it, the fear of losing everything, even freedom. Lastly, there's the career as a District Attorney which the Prosecutor is more interested in than the actual facts, there's the innocent acting as a scapegoat rather than getting to the bottom of the legal matter, especially because the time factor becomes crucial to swiftly produce a verdict that closes the issue for everyone – jurors, lawyers, involved relatives. In short, there’s a lot on the table even though not everything is cooked, and in any case, the film is worth watching even just for its unexpected ending and the beginning characterized by what we usually call “the coincidences of fate”.