kiramorena I watched this movie because I had nothing better to do at the moment. I wasn't really paying attention at the beginning, but then, it sucked me in... somewhere around the middle, I was sitting speechless, with my mouth open and in shock - how come I never heard anything about this masterpiece before?! The movie easily made it's way to my 'top 5 movies of all time' list, and I recommend it to everybody who like inconvenient, intelligent and brave stories. One more thing - try to stay out of the 'political background', 'propaganda', 'bad copy of a classic' talking, just enjoy the magnificent acting and the touching story that leaves all of us with divided opinions, but forces us to think about it, over and over again. That's the whole point!

Roland E. Zwick "12" is two title-words shorter and a full sixty-three minutes longer than "Twelve Angry Men," the 1957 Sydney Lumet classic on which this turgid Russian drama is based. Despite the obvious language difference, the Nikita Mikhalkov/Alexandr Novotosky/Vladimir Moiseyenko screenplay follows the Reginald Rose original - which began life as a "Studio One" teleplay in 1954 - fairly closely in form and outline. Again, eleven members of a jury stand ready to convict a young man of first-degree murder (in this case, for killing his foster father, an officer in the Russian army, for money) - until, that is, the lone holdout is able to sow enough doubt in the other jurors' minds to eventually get them to vote his way. And while in the original film the suspect faced racism and xenophobia on account of his being Hispanic, the suspect here suffers a similar fate for being Chechnyan.In the central role of the original dissenter, Sergei Makovetsky lacks the easily recognizable charm and charisma of Henry Fonda - and while this may make him a bit more believable as an "everyman" figure, it also makes him a less compelling focal point for a drama that takes far too long to play itself out. The extended length results, primarily, from the inclusion of brief flashbacks to the defendant's past, recounting the lead-up to the crime and the crime itself, as well as from individual speeches that drone on long past the point where any point can still be made. Each of the twelve jurors gets his moment in the spotlight to ham it up and declaim wildly on his theories about the case, his hatred of one ethnic group or another (in addition to anti-Chechnya sentiment, there's a great deal of anti-Semitism floating around the room as well), and the deplorable state of life in Russia - till the point where we no longer care about these people or the decision they're being forced to make. Eventually, we just want to get out of that place as badly as the men who are trapped inside it. And not all the talk about the Russian soul, not all the discussions of national politics or personal spleen-venting on the part of the participants can make us care one iota about the drama that's unfolding.The question one must finally ask when watching "12" is why anyone would want to take a work like "Twelve Angry Men," celebrated for its brevity and dramatic precision, and turn it into a lumbering, ponderous, elephantine bore - replete with endless speechifying and scenery-chewing performances. Why indeed!

imxo I found this movie to be a theatrical feast, but with a couple of nagging annoyances.I want to get the annoying parts off my chest first, because chronologically that's how I encountered the movie. It seems to me that Russians have never mastered the art of sound mixing. Whether in old Soviet films or in this modern Russian one, there is always something not quite right with the sound.As the film began I found that the background noises were much louder than the speech of the actors. The sounds of doors slamming, children yelling, workers working, and so on were loud and clear, but the actors' voices were practically whispers in that maelstrom. I don't know why that is. Could it be only in the foreign, sub-titled version of the film? I don't see complaints about the sound levels from anyone else, but I'm pretty sure it's not just me. I desperately wanted to listen to the Russian dialog, but the low audio level of the voices forced me to read the sub-titles throughout most of the film. It was a bit like walking with a small stone in my shoe.Not having seen the "12 Angry Men" movie on which this current film was based, I was forced to accept "12" on its own merits. Thus, I experienced this film not as a remake of a previous movie, but as a filmed a stage play with phenomenal actors. Perhaps as a result, I unequivocally enjoyed this acting extravaganza. There may have been some occasional carpet chewing, but overall the performances were astounding. I certainly wish the IMDb list of players had more information about who played which role and had more biographical information about the individual actors. Perhaps someone familiar with Russian films and actors could throw more light on the matter. Much the same criticism, of course, could apply to IMDb's level of information on foreign films in general.Frankly, I didn't take the matter of the guilt or innocence of the "accused" very seriously. With all the theorizing the jurors were doing, and with the serious lack of real information for us in the audience, there was absolutely no way to determine real guilt or innocence. If anything, the flashback scenes were more confusing than enlightening. So, as far as I was concerned, it was the jurors, particularly the "Great Russians" among them - who were at the center of the film. Watching their "paralysis by analysis" was the real treat, irrespective of whether they reached the right conclusion in the end. As far as that conclusion is concerned, I have no idea what Mikhalkov means by it. His own screen character was obviously implying that he has a unique insight into things, intimating that perhaps he had been at one time in the KGB, GRU, or had been a member of some other allegedly all-knowing organization? Frankly, this was a bit off-putting and seemed to imply that the State and its workers knew things that the average citizen just hadn't a need to know. In any event, despite having a relatively modest role for most of the film, at the end Mikhalkov came a little too much to the fore for my taste. I'd be very happy to read a Russian reviewer's explanation of Mikhalkov's character.A word or two about the depiction of Chechens. The music, dancing, and overwhelming maleness of Chechen culture were solidly, if briefly, presented. One certainly cannot stereotype all Chechen men as being similar to the Chechen fighters depicted in this film, but the characterization of those fighters was phenomenal. In this film the Chechens fighters' raw power to intimidate, threaten, and attack their enemies those was palpable. I'm aware that even Alexander Solzhenitsyn praised the indomitable culture of Chechens in the Gulag. They just never, ever, yielded to the Soviets.So, I rate this film very highly. Perhaps I'm missing the film's more subtle propaganda that some here have mentioned, but that's something I can continue to think more about. I highly recommend "12."

d_aleksandrov "In a scene showing a Chechen town the writing on the wall says "Don't shoot. Only women and children here" but only in Russian. In Chechnia all signs like that were written in three languages - Russian, Chechen and Arabic because Middle Eastern mercenaries participating the conflict could not read in Russian. Besides, it's difficult to believe someone would put such a sign and thus indicate there is SOMEONE in there." In Russia EVERYTHING is believable, that's what Nikita Mikhalkov wants to say. This movie is a fiction, don't forget it! But all the stories told in it are possible and the way of thinking of these people may be hard to understand, but it's true. This film is a cut through the Russian Soul and it's great.