Beyond a Reasonable Doubt

6/27/2016

Why would a man frame himself... for murder? Beyond a Reasonable Doubt is directed by Peter Hyams and Hyams adapts the screenplay from Douglas Morrow's story/screenplay for the 1956 film of the same name. It stars Jesse Metcalfe, Amber Tamblyn, Michael Douglas, Joel David Moore and Orlando Jones. Music is by David Shire and Hyams also tackles cinematography duties. C.J. Nicholas (Metcalfe) is a journalist aiming for high things. He is convinced that high profile lawyer Mark Hunter (Douglas) is corrupting legal issues and sets about proving it... The 1956 film was the great Fritz Lang's last American film, more court drama than being overtly film noir, it was a film well tuned into legalities of its time. Hyams here updates to a modern era setting and it is fanciful - due to the

9/13/2022

The only thing that’s beyond a reasonable doubt here is this movie’s stupidity. The film opens with District Attorney Mark Hunter (Michael Douglas) addressing the jury at a murder trial: “The defense would like to tell you that our entire case is circumstantial. There are no eyewitnesses, no ballistic match, no alibi." Odd. One would think that a prosecutor who has scored 17 murder convictions in a row would view the absence of an alibi as something that favors the prosecution and not the defense. Reporter C.J. Nicholas (Jesse Metcalfe) is convinced that Hunter is corrupt; all 17 convictions were decided by DNA evidence that Nicholas is certain was planted in some way by Hunter. For example, a cigarette butt photographed at a crime scene belongs to a cigarette the defendant is shown s