‘Juror No. 2’ Review: Clint Eastwood’s Modest Moral Drama Gets Us Thinking Outside the (Jury) Box
variety.comPeter Debruge Chief Film Critic If you think jury duty’s a drag, consider how much worse sitting in judgment of others could be if, on the first day of the trial, you were to discover the defendant’s been accused of a terrible crime for which you were in fact the one responsible.
That’s the hook of Clint Eastwood’s latest — and some fear last — feature, “Juror No. 2,” a slightly preposterous but thoroughly engaging extension of the 94-year-old filmmaker’s career-long fascination with guilt, justice and the limitations of the law.
In movies where Eastwood acts, guns go a long way to resolve problems the system can’t. But the director does not appear in “Juror No.
2,” a moral-minded courtroom drama in which Nicholas Hoult plays the lone holdout in a murder trial. The film may open on a note of idealism, but it quickly turns cynical as Hoult’s character, “perfect” husband and upstanding citizen Justin Kemp, who honors his jury summons, even though he’d rather be home with his pregnant wife Ally (Zoey Deutch).
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