It is a phone call that starts it. The telephone rings three times, and the voice on the other end asks for “Vinny.”
The man answers the phone with enthusiasm. Having passed the bar exam only a few weeks before, this may be his first client.
This is the story of Vincent Gambini, a newly-minted Brooklyn attorney, and it is told in one of the best courtroom movies of all time, My Cousin Vinny. Though it is an absurd comedy, it illustrates the reality of trial.
The plot is simple. Vinny’s nephew and his college buddy at NYU are traveling through the deep South when a local sheriff pulls them over, charging them with murder of a convenience store clerk. The guys are a thousand miles from home with no money for an attorney. They use their one phone call to contact the only lawyer they know.
Because Vinny has no legal work, he comes to the boys’ aid.
However, defending a murder case is way over Vinny’s head, and in the rural courtroom he is an outsider. He is “not from around here.”
Vinny’s story is one of perseverance. We learn he failed the bar exam not just once, but five times! He succeeded on his sixth attempt.
The first several days of trial go badly for Vinny. The reality of a limited budget, limited preparation, an impatient judge, a ruined suit, hostile experts, botched witness examinations, and the constant intrusions of real life.
Despite every obstacle and setback, Vinny finds new ways of doing things and overcomes the challenges.
Vinny Gambini teaches us that good attorneys never, ever give up, no matter what the obstacles. We must either find a way or make one. A winner is just a loser who tried one more time.
President Teddy Roosevelt, an attorney, described what should be the credo of every Primerus lawyer:
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."
The director of Vinny, Jonathan Lynn, graduated with a law degree from Cambridge and made sure that every courtroom scene was technically accurate. Everything in the movie occurring during the trial could happen and often does happen.
In an interview, Lynn explained the how the film differs from any other law movie:
“[T]here aren’t any bad guys in the film. Most films seem to have a corrupt judge or a corrupt prosecutor or there’s somebody who’s a bad guy. There are no bad guys in Vinny. . . . [T]he judge is not corrupt. He’s very correct and a little straight-laced, but he’s not a bad guy. He’s fair. The prosecutor is more than fair. Nobody’s doing anything wrong.”
Though a farce, this film rings true.