I just want to make sure I'm on the right track. thanks.
last year second topic.
There are many elements in Twelve Angry Men that serve to address the text’s themes of decision making and legal justice. Reginald Rose utilises these various elements to challenge the audience in order to consider issues such as why it is difficult for the jurors to reach a final verdict. While prejudice, perception of the facts, personal experiences and stubbornness lead the case to much complexity, the 3rd Juror’s personal involvement in the case makes it very hard for the jurors from finalising a verdict.
The perception of ‘facts’ diverts the whole course of the play: delaying process in reaching a final verdict. The word ‘fact’ is loosely tossed in the room without much though about its meaning. Very frequently statements such as “You’ve heard the facts” and “You can’t refute the facts” are uttered and not followed up with any detail about what those facts are. When facts are detailed, they appear to be convincing and thus easing the process of reaching a final verdict. On the other hand, the disclosure of an identical knife by the 8th Juror demonstrates how a fact might turn out to be not true while the 3rd Juror considers the case one of ‘open-shut cases’ by his ‘personal facts’. He is so attached to the case because of his desire to punish the defendant due to his feeling of anger and betrayal towards his son. This feeling leads him to personalising the facts. Additionally, the word ‘fact’ is gradually stripped of its power by the time it is used by the 10th juror to describe stereotyped characteristics of particular socio-economic groups: “Let’s talk facts. They don’t know what the truth is. They think different. They act different. Well, that’s right.” Hence, ‘facts’ in this speech entirely become a tool in imposing malicious intentions as stated by the 11 the Juror, “Facts may be coloured by the personalities of people who present them.” In essence then, perception of facts from the 3rd juror to 10the Juror is one of the great obstructions in reaching a final verdict.