The theme of “Marshall” is a familiar one with a Black man being held a prisoner for the raping, beating and then kidnapping a wealthy White woman he works for to cover up the crime. It takes place in Connecticut in 1941.

            Thurgood Marshall is at the beginning of his career and is representing the man Joseph Spell and also the NAACP in a fight for justice at a very racist time. It is due to the racism of the Judge that forces Marshall to hire a White Jewish man to lead the council making the former the second chair in the trial and not allowed to speak to the court in defense of the man.

           A local Jewish lawyer, who faces his own discrimination because of his religion, Sam Friedman who is not a criminal lawyer having handled only insurance and accident cases.

           If the movie had been called “Sam” it would be the same story but not hold the cache that the name Thurgood Marshall does. Without knowing a thing about this man you could write the screenplay or, at the least, know what is going to happen.

           What makes “Marshall” different is that the story, no matter how many times you see/read/hear about it the horror of what happens and how it happens comes up and you find yourself shaking your head in disbelief or gasping and not wanting to believe things like that happened in the USA and still do!

            The movie is lifted above the run of the mill because it does involve the career of a man who would one day sit on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States as the first Black Judge.

            It is also lifted by the performances by the cast starting with Chadwick Boseman as Thurgood Marshall bringing the force of the man who would bring much change to our country. Josh Gad as the Jewish lawyer Sam Friedman is Boseman’s equal in acting even if cheated by the screenplay in filling out his character.

            Sterling K. Brown as the possible rapist Joseph Spell who is not exactly as he may seem to be and the accuser Eleanor Strubing played by Kate Hudson may have secrets of her own to hide both give right on performances.

           What sets this ‘seen it before’ trial on a different level are the odd coupling of the lawyers defending the suspect but even more so the judge played by James Cromwell refusing the defense team the basic courtesies of a courtroom because of his own racism.

            In this small snippet of Thurgood Marshall’s lifewe do see what made the man he would become but we are also shown the racism and anti-Semitism that was so prevalent in the North in the 1940s.

           Based on a true story staying for the end credits gives an interesting history of what happened to the people involved though I don’t recall any reference to Strubing and Spell and am interested enough to see if anything more is written of them.

           “Marshall” is a good movie on many levels starting with the involved courtroom drama, extending to the high performances by all involved plus the history of a man many may not know in addition to another man almost never heard of since this trial and what he dealt with and was to become of this one case he lead, first as a frontman than as the leader.

           The screenplay by Michael and Jacob Koskoff, the former a veteran civil rights lawyer, the latter his son, hold the audiences interest as far as the courtroom case, the accused and accuser and all involved concerned while the director Reginald Hudlin does a workingman’s job smartly giving the actors the leeway to be their characters.

            Would “Marshall” be as good a movie without that name and not being about that person? I think so but his name adds the gravitas to separate it from being just another movie.

Movie Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_bfOWof0Sg