Music Box

A courtroom film in which a lawyer defends her own father. Ann Talbot is a successful lawyer in Chicago. Her father Mike Laszlo came from Hungary and has lived there for years. One day an official notice arrives: the government is moving to strip him of citizenship over crimes committed during the war, and deportation proceedings begin. Ann believes her father and takes the case herself. The film's progress is about how that belief wears away: witnesses appear, documents are opened, the other side points out inconsistencies, and as a lawyer Ann has to demolish them. The question at the centre is whether a person can accept that someone they love is someone else. The film also goes outside the courtroom and concerns itself with Ann rereading her own childhood. Jessica Lange plays Ann and Armin Mueller-Stahl her father. Lange was Oscar-nominated for the role. Costa-Gavras directed; the screenplay is by Joe Eszterhas. It won the Golden Bear in Berlin. A strong example for anyone who likes courtroom drama and political cinema. Before you watch, know this: the narrative relays wartime violence in detail through testimony.