MartinHafer
When the film begins, a scum-bag husband is meeting with his mistress. She informs him that she's pregnant AND she's giving him an ultimatum to dump his wife...or else. Not at all surprisingly, he soon strangles her to death! Soon there is a trial for the murder of this woman...but the police have arrested the wrong man...her husband (Nick Nolte) and not her lover. Now here is an insane coincidence...the murderer's wife (Cloris Leachman) is picked for the jury...and through the course of this film, she comes to realize that her own husband might have done the killing! So what does she do next? The plot here is very difficult to believe but could work. Sure, it's a HUGE coincidence that the woman would be on the jury for a crime her husband actually committed. But, if well written, the audience can suspend disbelief just this once. Unfortunately, this movie isn't particularly well written because they make the wife too stupid to live. Why? Because when she thinks her husband might have done the crime, she doesn't go to the judge or either of the attorneys to tell them but instead tells her husband!!! And then, she picks up the phone to call the police instead of leaving to get help!! This essentially makes the lady too dumb to be real AND makes women look stupid (after all, the mistress was incredibly stupid to give her lover such an ultimatum). Perhaps such things might have been more likely in films of the era...nowadays I am sure many women would be offended by this sort of nonsense. As a result, I am knocking off a few points...as it could have been handled much more intelligently and would have been a much better movie of the week.This is a film I would really love to watch with a lawyer. This is because as a non-lawyer I don't know how inappropriate the prosecuting attorney was during the course of the trial. Many times his witnesses didn't just report what they saw and knew but drew very damning conclusions---conclusions that obviously would have colored the jury. Sure, the defense attorney objected but it happened often enough I wondered if it would have normally resulted in a mistrial.
DigitalRevenantX7
Plot Synopsis: John Healy is placed on trial for the murder of his wife. Everyone in the town is of the opinion that he is guilty but as the trial goes on, one of the female jurors begins to suspect that her own husband had an affair with the murder victim & killed her to keep their affair secret.The Review: Death Sentence (not to be confused with the more recent film by SAW mastermind James Wan) was an early 1970s made-for-television film produced by Aaron Spelling, the master of that era's television soap operas. It also features Nick Nolte in one of his early roles.Death Sentence is, in most respects, an unremarkable film. Nothing in the film stands out in any way (except perhaps for Nolte giving one of his better performances as the murder victim's husband, a role that Nolte nails with such precision that you wonder if he was actually being himself), not even the novelty plot device that plays with every juror's worst nightmare – what if you were on the jury in a murder trial & you discover that your partner was responsible for the deed?The other thing I must mention is the fact that producer Spelling must have been hands-on with the film featuring the same brand of needless melodramatics that his other works have featured. I thought the idea of revealing the killer early on in the film was kind of interesting but it also has the effect of taking all the mystery out of it – other than the climax, you are never on the edge of your seat..
paulmasters1
This "movie" was incredibly painful to watch. Stilted, wooden dialogue, utterly predictable plot, lousy directing and bad camera work - in short, this thing's a train wreck.The film possesses a strange juxtaposition of talented-but-wasted well-known actors (Leachman, Nolte, Luckinbill, Schallert) and eager-but-untalented relative unknowns. That the director approved this atrocity and that TV network executives allowed it to be aired is incredible. And now it's available on DVD - but why???The talents of Ms. Leachman and Mr. Nolte are completely wasted. At least Ms. Leachman redeemed herself later that year (1974) in Young Frankenstein.
raypaquin
Seeing the name 'Nick Nolte' prominently displayed on the DVD jacket made me buy this film. I am sorry I did. Nolte has no more than a few lines to say. The other actors are *all* great. The problem is the scenario, which is full of holes. This, in a judicial suspense drama, is fatal. I suspect that my DVD only has a shortened version (74 minutes) of a longer film (90 minutes according to your database) that might explain the glaring holes. On my DVD, the picture quality is *worse* that what you would expect from a standard-resolution TV picture. The scenario-writer is billed as 'John Nuefield' instead of 'John Neufeld'. Is this a spelling mistake ? The year in the copyright notice at the ending credits states '1972' instead of '1974'. In any case, it is certainly a Spelling mistake as Aaron Spelling produced this El-Cheapo picture. Avoid.
AD
