Lumet is back in the courtroom

With his latest film, “Find Me Guilty,” 81-year-old director Sidney Lumet returns to a genre that has served him well over the past 50 years: the courtroom drama.

“Guilty,” which opens Friday, revolves around what is billed as the longest criminal trial in U.S. history, when 20 members of the Lucchese crime family were brought to court in 1987 on 76 charges.

Vin Diesel plays one of the key defendants, Giacomo “Jackie Dee” DiNorscio, amid a 30-year term for drug trafficking, who decides to defend himself -- with humor and never-say-die determination.

Lumet, a former child actor, began directing in live television in the 1950s, quickly establishing a reputation along with John Frankenheimer, Arthur Penn and Franklin Schaffner as one of the young Turks of the new medium.

In 1957, he got his first chance to direct a feature, the courtroom drama “Twelve Angry Men,” which had been seen first as a live TV drama. Henry Fonda, who also produced the film, led the ensemble cast as a juror in a murder trial who slowly convinces the rest of the jury that the young man accused of a crime is not guilty. “Twelve Angry Men” received three Oscar nominations, including best film and director.

Lumet received an adapted screenplay nomination with Jay Presson Allen for 1981’s “Prince of the City,” which explored police corruption. The next year, Lumet received his last best director Academy Award nomination for “The Verdict,” adapted by David Mamet from the novel by Barry Reed. Paul Newman also picked up an Oscar nomination for this gripping drama in which he plays an alcoholic attorney who decides to redeem himself and his career by taking a medical malpractice suit to trial rather than settling out of court. James Mason, in one of his final films, received an Oscar nomination for his turn as a high-powered attorney.

Since “The Verdict,” Lumet has had mixed success with legal films. There have been a few turkeys, such as “Guilty as Sin” and “Night Falls on Manhattan,” but two projects -- 1990’s “Q & A” and the 2001-02 A&E; series “100 Centre Street” -- found Lumet at the top of his game.

The director gets sterling performances from his cast in “Q & A,” which he also wrote based on the book by Edwin Torres. The drama stars Timothy Hutton as a naive district attorney who sets out to prove a case again a corrupt detective (Nick Nolte).

Though it didn’t catch on with viewers, “100 Centre Street,” for which Lumet was an executive producer and occasional director, was considered an inspired drama that revolved around New York City’s arraignment court.

-- Susan King