Juror # 2: Nachos Southern Style 🥁 🥁 🥁 1/2

Year Released: 2021
Directed by: Clint Eastwood
Starring: Nicholas Hoult, Toni Collette, J.K Simmons, Kiefer Sutherland
(PG-13, 113 min.)
Genre: Legal Drama, Mystery and Suspense

“Justice is blind.  Guilt sees everything.”

A modern 12 Angry Men, but with a twist.  Don’t expect the same wonderful acting or script as that 1957 classic, but director Clint Eastwood, even at 94, puts our flawed human nature under the microscope once again.

Juror #2 follows family man Justin Kemp who, while serving as a juror in a high profile murder trial, finds himself struggling with a serious moral dilemma…one he could use to sway the jury verdict and potentially convict or free he accused killer.

Strangely, the film was intended to be direct to streaming but did debut at some limited theaters.   Here is what Variety said about the decision:

Warner Bros.' decision to deny the film a wide release as "a peculiar approach for a filmmaker who still has commercial appeal", noting that Eastwood had been making films for Warner Bros. for 50 years and was still delivering major commercial successes, including American Sniper (2014), Sully (2016), and The Mule (2018).

Some see this decision as evidence of problems in the film studio system, as Vulture’s Bilge Ebiri as suggested:

Warner Bros.' decision implied deep problems with the modern-day studio system, suggesting that "Eastwood, for all his genre cred and iconic stature, is one of the few major filmmakers left making studio-financed adult dramas. To the modern studio executive, he must look like a glitch in the matrix  – not an artist to be protected, but an error to be corrected."

And that says a lot more about Hollywood than it does about Eastwood, doesn’t it?  And oh, they never mentioned the very successful 1997 film, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, filmed in Savannah, GA, as was Juror #2.

***

Without giving too much away, so much revolves around Justin Kemp  (Nicholas Hoult), a recovered alcoholic – or as they use the term, “recovering alcoholic,” hitting what he thinks is a deer on a very rainy night one year earlier than the murder trial.  And as the trial begins, juror#2 (a sneaky reference to juror#2 who turns things around in 12 Angry Men), he begins to wonder about that, especially since the high profile murder occurred on the same date and place that he remembers hitting a deer.

Everyone has a reason for calling the case as they see fit.

Toni Collete, who played Nicolas’ Hoult’s mother in 2002’s About a Boy is no longer her son’s prone-to depression mother, or as Hugh Grant calls her in the film “Ms. Granola Suidide.”

Here she is completely the opposite, a hard-nosed prosecutor hoping to use the domestic violence aspect of this case to super charge her run for district attorney.

So, no more home knit caps for her or her son, played by juror #2 himself when he was a full faced social misfit back then.  And, in fact, Hoult is almost unrecognizable all grown up here – handsome, happily marr, and on the verge of becoming father.

A few others play against type, too. J.K. Simmons is no longer the demeaning and demanding music conductor – one who would give Bobby Knight’s chair throwing a run for his money – that he portrayed in his Oscar winning role in 2014’s Whiplash. 

Here he is a conscientious juror with a law enforcement background (maybe those old Law and Order roots are still there), determined to find out the truth behind the fuzzy and conflicting details meted out to the jury. Even if he defies jury protocol to do a little detective work on his own outside of hours.

Kiefer Sutherland is no longer counter terrorism Agent Jack Bauer, “racing against the clock to subvert terrorist plots,” but a fellow recovering alcoholic who is Juror #2’s AA sponsor. And he just happens to be a lawyer, too. The “friendly advice” he offers Kemp is, however, almost as deadly as some of those cliffhanger disasters he averts during his long run in the series 24 (2001-2014).

Not too many new films are worth the watch right now, but this recent Clint Eastwood directed one is well worth it.  And why not make it a binge worthy weekend to get through this last? bite of winter ushering us all inside waiting for cabin fever to break out?

Couple it with watching 12 Angry Men or some other great courtroom dramas such as The Verdict, The Judge, Anatomy of a Murder, or Jagged Edge.

–Kathy Borich
🥁🥁🥁1/2

Trailer

Film-Loving Foodie

The pivotal scene starts out at the local bar, not one of those pricey ones where they serve White Beam Hummus, Chicken/Schnitzel, Pepper-Crusted Swordfish, or even the Fizroy Burger, a $20 dish served with “Havarti, Caramelized Onion, and Rosemary Aioli.” The Fizroy is the actual bar they used to film interior shots  in Juror #2.

Here is the exterior shot of Rowdy’s Hideaway, which is the William A. Reed Memorial Post 660 Canteen and Grill (also known as VFW Post 660) outside Savannah on Ogeechee Road. 

This one is a more normal bar, where food like wings, nachos, and chicken tenders are more the thing.  Let’s go with some nachos, then, ok?

Ours are Southern Style.

Nachos Southern Style

Ingredients

Guacamole:

1 avocado

1/2 shallot, chopped 

1 tomato, diced 

1 lime, juiced 

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper 

Hot sauce, for seasoning

Nachos:

10 cups black bean tortillas chips (about 8 ounces)

1 cup chopped smoked jalapeño sausage or other spicy sausage (about 6 ounces)

2 cups shredded Cheddar

3 scallions, chopped 

1 tablespoon cornstarch 

About 1 1/2 cups half-and-half 

One 8-ounce jar chopped pimientos, drained 

1 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed 

1/2 cup pickled jalapeños

1/4 cup sliced black olives 

1/4 cup sour cream 

 Directions

1.       For the guacamole: Add the avocado flesh to a bowl and smash. Mix in the shallot, tomato and lime juice. Season with salt and pepper and shake in some hot sauce.

2.     For the nachos: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

3.     Spread the tortilla chips on a sheet pan and bake until hot, about 10 minutes.

4.     Meanwhile, cook the sausage in a skillet, stirring, until browned, about 4 minutes. Remove from the heat.

5.     Combine the cheese, scallions and cornstarch in a medium saucepan. Add 1 1/4 cups half-and-half and cook over medium heat, whisking constantly, until melted and smooth. Stir in the pimientos. Add more half-and-half if necessary for a nice drizzling consistency.

Transfer half of the chips to a large dish and top with half the sausage, beans, jalapeños and olives. Drizzle generously with the cheese sauce. Add the remaining chips, sausage, beans, jalapeños and olives. Drizzle on more cheese sauce, then top with the guacamole and sour cream. Serve additional cheese sauce on the side for dipping