Summer Cinema Should Be Sweaty Spoilers

When I think of summer movies, my mind automatically goes to Mamma Mia, Theatre Camp, Before Sunrise: upbeat, romantic, fun, and ideally musical.

Then my mind wanders… Challengers, Another Round (Druk), Portrait of a Lady on Fire, and 12 Angry Men. Movies that summarize what else summer can be: hot, dramatic, sweaty, and tense.

During university, I romanticized summer as a time where I could relax, catch up with childhood friends, be more active, and magically fix all of my problems. And each year, summer would roll around and nothing drastic would change. I'd meet some friends, walk a bit, and have some fun, but my wishful thinking would remain just that. Summer didn't make my winter wallowing disappear, but rather, reinvigorated it.

I recently came back from a trip in France and Spain with my partner and his family. It was a really lovely vacation with minimal drama, but I found myself reflecting on how the heat made us all more irritable. When it's 40 degrees and humid outside, you realize how much you take iced water, AC, and calm energy for granted. The following text to my best friend summarizes how I was feeling:

All this to say, let summer be angry!

For my birthday (which is in the summer) this year, I requested to watch 12 Angry Men for family movie night. This classic film had been on my watchlist for years, and as a theatre kid, I'm a sucker for chamber pieces and movies that are dialogue-driven.

12 Angry Men is a 1957 legal drama film directed by Sidney Lumet, set in a suffocating courthouse room, on a hot summer day. A jury of twelve men deliberate whether a teenager is guilty or innocent of murdering his father. While all the jurors initially agree that the boy is guilty, Juror 8 (Henry Fonda) debates the case's testimonies and advocates for the boy's innocence. The jury spirals from there, as the men argue and debate over the case and each juror's prejudices. It's a brilliant film that examines bias, groupthink, bigotry, and the dangers of McCarthyism. (The moment when they all turned their backs on Juror 10 really solidified this as a 5-star watch for me. Amazing blocking.)

The atmosphere of summer is an essential character to 12 Angry Men. At the start of the film, Juror 7 tells another juror that “this is going to be the hottest day of the year” according to the Weather Bureau. The room's fan is broken, and the men are sweating through their clothes. The room feels increasingly claustrophobic as the men get fiery towards Juror 8 and his casting doubt on the defendant's guilt. The men use handkerchiefs to clean the sweat from their foreheads and faces, as heat and pressure cook in the room. The jurors are eager to get a verdict and go home, acting impatient with each other - interrupting and speaking over each other - as time stretches slow in the room. The sweltering sun mirrors how uncomfortable, hostile, and hot-headed the men are, while the single room grows cramp.

Juror 8 continues to change minds and when the votes become equal for guilty and not-guilty, the fan starts to work and it begins to rain outside. The rainstorm represents the cathartic breakthroughs in the jurors' arguments and preconceptions as the men start thinking clearer and acting more rational towards the case. The room becomes less chaotic and hostile as the men begin to agree with Juror 8 - save for Juror 10 and Juror 3 who continue to argue that the boy is guilty. Juror 10 resigns himself to Juror 8's side after a racist outrage that the other men isolate themselves from, and Juror 3 realizes that his strained relationship with his son is clouding his judgement towards the case. The case eventually concludes, acquitting the boy. When the jury leaves court, the rain has cleared the tension up and the sky is clear again.

Summer is many things, but one thing people like to ignore (fair enough!) is how hot weather can impact your emotions for the worse. Cinema can help us escape to a musical Greek island or a romantic vacation, but it can also sit us in an oppressive courtroom with twelve impatient, perspiring, and disgruntled men. Both are quintessential to summer.

It's time for me to admit that sweltering heat makes me cantankerous, even though I usually am quite easygoing. But as Sidney Lumet's film demonstrates, summer is a perfect time to sweat your tension, grievances, prejudices, and anger away.