The Judge

Written by Nick Shenk ("Gran Torino") and Bill Dubuque, director David Dobkins' ("Wedding Crashers") new film "The Judge" is a long and confused look at fractured family relations. Or is it a murder mystery? Or a courtroom drama? Or about brothers overcoming their past? Or about first loves that haven't gone away?

Well, if you guessed all of the above, you'd be right. And that's just one of the many problems with this overlong, but well-intentioned drama.

Not as schmaltzy as the trailer would have you believe, "The Judge" feels like it's based on a book, what with numerous subplots and a setup that goes in one direction then veers off into another. Robert Downey, Jr. plays Hank Palmer, a big city lawyer in Chicago that represents the guilty that can afford his fees. But when he gets a call that his mother has died in his home state of Indiana, he makes the trip back home. Once there, we meet his brother Dale (Jeremy Strong), who seems to have Asperger's, but that's never explained; his other brother, Glen (Vincent D'Onfrio); and finally his father, "Judge Palmer" (Robert Duvall) the town's beloved guardian of the law. It is clear up front that Hank and his dad have a long standing non-relationship, and the tension is palpable. This begins a series of scenes where Hank puffs himself up to prove his worth, while his dad scowls around and his brothers try to keep the peace.

When Hank is finally ready to leave, he notices his father's car has extensive damage to one side. Knowing his father might have fallen off the wagon again and had gone to the convenience store the night of his wife's funeral, Hank is concerned. All seems to be okay until he gets a call just as his flight is about to take off that a body was found; the body of someone with whom Judge Palmer has a history, and very well may have murdered. Hank is reluctantly pulled back home to help out.

This all seems fairly status quo as these sorts of melodramas go, and it's understandable why the Iron Man himself wanted to go back to his days of character work. This is the kind of movie that would feel right at home with the films of the '80s and early '90s that used to draw adult audiences and critical
acclaim. The problem is in the execution, where things are either not fully fleshed out or they are hit with a sledgehammer.

Some of the plot points that are skimmed over seem like editing room mistakes. For example, when we meet Hank's brothers, we are in the funeral home. There is no mention of any "brother," so we aren't sure if they are old high-school buddies or what. It takes quite a while for the fact that they are siblings to be established. Dale's mental status is never explained, nor is his penchant for filming everything with an old school 8mm camera. Sure, it looks cool later when he shows everyone "the good old days," but it doesn't feel organic. A little backstory would have helped.

Worse still is the relationship between Hank and his old high school flame Samantha (Vera Farmiga). The role is underwritten and feels like it was added
on because a studio head said there needed to be a love interest. While their chemistry is terrific, not only does she disappear for a good chunk of the
film, but there are some weird plot twists involving her and her daughter that are unnecessary and add nothing to their plot thread.

There's just so much going on here you don't know where to focus. There are endless scenes with Hank and his father at war with each other, storming off
in opposite directions, with one of these confrontations occurring during a tornado warning; nothing like piling on the obvious analogies.

The cast does their best, and in earlier times this would have been one of those Oscar bait movies for Downey, Jr. and Duvall. But the pedestrian handling of the script causes interest to wane, even when watching good actors do good work. The movie clocks in at almost two and a half hours and has about seven false endings. Not to mention, the central mystery surrounding the court case that gets Hank to stay isn't all that interesting and becomes tertiary to other story threads. In the end, the court case feels lackluster and simply the catalyst for father and son to make amends. That's not a spoiler because even from the trailer alone you know that's what this movie is gunning for. You get it, it just takes forever to get there.