Best movie of this year hands down!

Great Film overall

It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

One of the best courtroom dramas ever for sure! An amazing movie with surprise after a surprise! Many memorable characters and scenes. Superb performances by the main cast, and a great pace that manages to hold the suspense high throughout the movie. Highly recommended!

No need to recap plot or consensus points. In many years of movie viewing I've never seen an uglier mug fill up the screen as often as Laughton's. Congratulations to Hollywood for breaking the pretty-face rule. But it's really no problem since it's Laughton's grumpily forceful manner that commands attention. Then there's his real life wife, Lanchester. Their scenes together are absolutely delicious —I wonder how they were at home. The screenplay is a champ at byplay without clouding the plot. In fact it's hard to guess where the murder mystery is going until the final surprise upshot, so the audience stays fully engaged. And for an enclosed courtroom drama, it's a real challenge to keep viewer attention focused. Yet the writers do, mainly with vividly drawn characters. On the whole, there's more character revelation than development as the drama plays out in the present tense courtroom. And since there's no action to speak of, the compelling result amounts a real triumph of both actors and writers combined. In passing—good to see movie vets like Daniell, Wolfe, and Varden picking up screen time and paydays. But thank goodness, O'Connor's snarling old lady doesn't play anyone's grandmother. Otherwise she could ruin the whole idea.

Charles Laughton was a great great actor. Billy Wilder was a great Director, Writer & Producer(remember Some Like It Hot, The Seven Year Itch, Sunset Boulevard, Love in the Afternoon, Irma la Douce, to name just a few?). Marlene Dietrich, great actress herself, specially in The Blue Angel. She is very good here too. But, the whole film does not have too much qualities, in fact, it's boring, only talk with a surprise at the end. Tyrone Power, as an actor, was not much, the most important contribution is that of being the father of Romina Power. Worth to see it only for Charles Laughton's and Marlene Dietrich's performances.

I grew up reading her novels and it was a pleasure to watch it act out on screen.Her stories are always simple, and its the same here - A guy befriends an older woman in the hopes that she might sponsor his invention (an egg beater). She is murdered. He was the last person that she saw. Evidence is scant.What Agatha Christie does is build up full characters and give us nearly full information. When the movie is done, and we look back, its the simplicity that absolutely stands out. She is like a brilliant engineer.And there is beautiful heart touching love included in its core. Just go see it, its more fulfilling that an Avengers movie.