While it sometimes gets a bit too heavy handed for its own good, it is still a very good courtroom drama and maybe the best Grisham adaptation yet.

It manages to capture the sultry South of America fantastically. It has an oppressive, sticky feel to it that reflects and accompanies the proceedings really well.

Schumacher directs his wonderful cast really well and paces his film perfectly. Given the subject matter, he has done really well to not turn this into a cliched, cheesy affair.

Such an underrated, deeply engaging, and riveting drama. Every performance is fantastic especially Jackson and the film is extremely powerful overall. Such a great movie that I don't think gets enough credit.

I have my brother to thank for pointing out this fantastic courtroom drama. It also made it into the 2nd Robinson Film Festival. (Check my lists for more info on Robinson Film Festivals)

This is the film that made me look at Matthew McConaughey as a serious actor who can pull a great performance out of the bag. This has been reinforced lately with his stellar turn in Killer Joe. In fact this film is littered with stand out performances. Jackson and Spacey both very worthy of a mention.

Gritty, intense and by far the best Grisham adaption to film. A Time To Kill is an extremely moving film that stands tall as one of the very best courtroom dramas ever made.

A little heavy-handed at times but ultimately well-intentioned and impactful, Joel Schumacher's A Time to Kill, based upon the novel by John Grisham, sees Matthew McConaughey's Mississippi lawyer defending Samuel L. Jackson, who shot dead the two racist hicks who raped his 10 year old daughter. It's a great cast, also including Kevin Spacey, Sandra Bullock, Oliver Platt, Ashley Judd, The Sutherlands, Sr and Jr., and Chris Cooper. It's well-written by Akiva Goldman, provocative, thought-provoking and powerful, slathered in sticky Deep South sweat and oppression. I do love a courtroom drama.

"Now imagine she's white."

I don't think I've ever gasped so hard in my life. So many brilliant moments in this film and such an intense story. Glad I finally saw it.

Not nearly as captivating as an adaptation to the masterclass that is the book should be, but it wasn't all bad. The courtroom sequences were raw yet intimate and significantly more entertaining than the melodramatic, unnecessary context Joel Schumacher loves so much, Matthew McConaughey is as charismatic as always, and the rest of the cast, besides Sandra Bullock (a previous rendition of nowadays' Megan Fox, if you will), isn't too bad either (when has Samuel L. Jackson ever been obnoxious in a role?). Worth a watch, but nothing more, and infinitely inferior to the book.

forgot how amazing this movie is. all the feels.

Such an underrated, deeply engaging, and riveting drama. Every performance is fantastic especially Jackson and the film is extremely powerful overall. Such a great movie that I don't think gets enough credit.

This film thinks it is smart but it is as dumb as shit. With the ever-escalating racial tensions in its small Mississippi town, it gets by with a number of false-equivalencies between the KKK and black groups that are painted as extremists like the NAACP (the truth lies in the middle etc. etc.). Its scale is wide-reaching but it is ill-equipped to handle it and the result is an overlong, sweaty parody of itself.

Joel Schumacher can direct a film, this and Falling Down proves it. That finale was fucking powerful, too bad the scene right after was so light hearted and the shift in tone didn't work at all

Pandering done right

2 / 4