dbborroughs
Unremarkable story of a newspaper man investigating the death of the jurors who wrongly corrected an innocent man who was eventually freed, but who committed suicide in a mental hospital by hanging himself and burning himself.If you can't instantly guess who the killer is really and who he is in the cast upon seeing him you're not paying attention.Okay story seems to be going nowhere for much of its running time. WHile never bad, there really is no tension because the plotting is so bad. We know way to much for it to ever work.Not bad, but not really worth losing 66 minutes to it either.
MartinHafer
Like many other B-movies, "The Missing Juror" really shows that it was rushed into production. After all, despite a very nice plot, the script is so littered with holes that it's a wonder the thing isn't mistaken for a piece of Swiss cheese! And I am talking about HUGE holes. It's a shame, really, as the idea was great and the film, despite its problems, was a lot of fun.George Macready plays an innocent man mistakenly sent to death row. Fortunately (perhaps), a reporter (Jim Bannon) is able to discover the real perpetrator and Macready is set free. However, his time in the death house apparently has destroyed his mind and he's sent to a sanitarium. Some time later, he apparently killed himself--though the body is so charred that identification is impossible. No one at all questions whether or not it was him--even though it's obvious that it might not be him (huge plot hole #1). Later, one-by-one, the members of the jury that convicted him begin to die. At this point you'd think someone would suggest that the dead man isn't dead and is killing the jurors...but not in this silly film. They only consider this towards the end of the film! Another huge plot problem is that Macready's body was apparently actually the foreman of this jury....and this man just happens to look almost exactly like Macready!!! So, when Macready walks around in a disguise as clever as Clark Kent's, no one is able to determine who he really is! Was this perhaps filmed on some planet other than ours where people are all blind or stupid?! Despite these HUGE problems, the idea of an innocent man snapping and exacting revenge is great. And, the way he kills them is also very good. In many ways, this plot was reminiscent of the much later film "The Abominible Doctor Phibes"--a cheesy but very enjoyable Vincent Price film. Plus, Macready and Bannon were very good actors stuck in a film that was beneath their talents. But, in spite of everything, I still kept watching as the film was entertaining throughout--even if EVERYONE in the audience was smarted than the folks in the film!!
dougdoepke
The story may have more holes than Grandma's sieve, but it's still worth catching up with. For one, it's got cult actress Janis Carter who always shows more eyeball than ought to be legally allowed, along with the high-class George Macready just then perfecting his mad cackle-- and whoever in production thought his cultured voice was not a dead give-a-way. It's also one of director Buddy Boetticher's first outings, and already he's a camera master—catch those graceful dolly moves across the cut-a-way rooms. Then there's literary muscleman and masseuse Mike Mazurki throttling Macready's face blue while on a flight of poetic abandon. I just wish some of that imagination had carried over to repairing the story holes, like how crank-confessor Trevor Bardette knows so many details of the killings. Speaking of Bardette, his highly enthused performance suggests A-grade pay for a B-grade movie, making his mad lather a movie high point. Clearly, the 50-dollar budget didn't go into lighting since some scenes resemble a bat's cave and require the eyes of one to make out what's happening. Nonetheless, the film has almost as many promising noirish elements as the classic Stranger on the Third Floor (1940)—as another reviewer aptly compares. Too bad someone didn't send the script down to Rewrite for some hole-plugging plaster.
tkasle
....which is so opposite reality as to be intentionally misleading."Juror" is NOT noir.It IS a poorly-written B "mystery", with little of that, but plenty of under- and over-acting.You can't even call it a pot-boiler because it never catches fire.The only reason it's "rarely seen" on TV these days is that only TCM would show it. (But you'll never see Osborne or Mankiewicz introducing it.)With the exception of classics like "The Wizard of Oz", "Gone With the Wind" and "It's a Wonderful Life", no network today will broadcast movies over 30 years old in order to attract that all-important 18-35 demographic.This clunker has nothing in common with "Stranger On The Third Floor" and it's an insult to say it's a twist on "And Then There Were None.""Juror" was just a paycheck for Budd Boetticher, who moved on to direct and team with Randolph Scott for some truly great 1950s westerns.Watch them, not this.
AD
