Sidney Lumet has made some of the greatest crime and courtroom melodramas of the 20^th Century. “Dog Day Afternoon,” “Serpico,” “The Verdict,” “Prince of the City,” “12 Angry Men,” “Q&A,” each and every one of these bristles with an authenticity many other directors only dream of achieving. Throw in another landmark or two, including the prescient television news satire “Network,” and you’re looking at a list of features ranking as some of the very best a person will ever see.

Now, with Lumet entering his eighth decade, comes another foray inside the courtroom, “Find Me Guilty.” It is the story of the landmark 1987-88 Lucchese crime family trial as seen through the yes of the one defendant who became his own lawyer, mid-level drug dealer Giacomo “Jackie Dee” DiNorscio (Vin Diesel). With 20 defendants, 76 charges, this trial lasted an astonishing 21 months, the longest in United States history. Through it all, Jackie Dee never lost his nerve, sense of humor or his unwavering faith in his mob family, refusing to rat out his bosses and coworkers even when, of all those being prosecuted, he was the one with the most to lose.

It is, unfortunately, not Lumet at his best. Thankfully, it is still a highly enjoyable motion picture, buoyed by Diesel’s charmingly clever central performance and the director’s ironhanded confidence in the material. Even better, fans will notice a surreal symmetry with Lumet’s past works, most notably the elegiac and tragic “Prince of the City.” It is as if the filmmaker, looking once again at the unflinching stigma of crime, punishment, truth, fidelity and conscience, has now reached a completely different conclusion, one maybe even more tragic than those unflinchingly portrayed in his previous films.

What do I mean? Going back to “Prince of the City,” that picture was also about the consequences of breaking silence, Treat Williams’ police detective left broken, desolate and in shambles because he strove to do the right thing and speak about the wrongdoing being done by fellow officers. In essence, he became a rat, and in doing so he lost all that was dearest to him, and even though justice was accomplished the battering his personal life took was irreparable.

Fast-forward almost a quarter decade and Lumet is still making movies about rats, only this time these turncoats live inside the Mafia and not the police department. At its core, “Find Me Guilty” is a celebration of a man who refuses to become a rat, would rather die than give up information on men who could care less if he lives or dies. When all is said and done, he is seen through the camera lens as a hero, the only tragedy the one that got him in trouble back at the beginning of the story in the first place.

There is an irony here, of course, and in all honesty I’m not sure I’m bright or eloquent enough to be the one to explain why it is so darn amusing. Thankfully, I don’t have to because Lumet’s work is giddily entertaining and surprisingly powerful whether you notice the irony or not. This may be the story of some very bad people caught up in a whirlwind circus they could care less about, Lumet still manages to cut through the theatrics and find the heart and soul of the men trapped in each of the event’s three rings.

The director does this using the simplest devices. There are no jumpcuts, no CGI-enhanced visuals, no Michael Bay-like edits reducing the whole thing to headache-inducing sound bites. Lumet uses his one main setting, a New York federal courthouse presided over by the magnanimous and stern Ron Silver, brilliantly, his camera gliding this way and that as if it were a feather. Drifting here to there, back and forth, slowly encircling the protagonists in its gaze, Lumet puts viewers right in the center of things, making the audience a member of both the defense and the prosecution with the slightest of unwavering brushstrokes.

Still, this isn’t perfection, wear and tear starting to show their age within the director’s legendarily style. Countless television shows do this courtroom thing seemingly every day of the week, usually with far more visceral power. Jolts of gimmicky humor are misplaced, forced and unfunny ebbing some of my growing interest with each and every joke. A few of the jovial montages bookending the piece are truly idiotic, each of them feeling like they were parts of a movie made in the 1950’s not one made just two years ago. “Find Me Guilty” also features one of the worst, most obnoxious musical scores I’ve ever had to deal with, most of it so inappropriate I couldn’t help but wish the director would have went the same route he did in “Dog Day Afternoon” and “Network” and jettisoned music altogether. 

What Lumet does have are knockout performances. Linus Roach is electric as the prosecuting attorney while Peter Dinklage, so memorable in “The Station Agent,” is darn-near Oscar-worthy as one of the primary defense attorneys. Then there is Annabella Sciorra. She has one scene, but it is the type of scene you talk about for weeks. The actress is flat-out incredible, so good you cannot take your eyes off of her. It is a dynamite sequence, easily the film’s benchmark moment, and if there is any justice it is a display we’ll all be talking about come the end of the year.

What I am positive I’ll be talking about throughout this year is Diesel. I’d almost forgotten, other than his looks, why I thought so much of the actor in the past. “The Pacifer” and “A Man Apart,” two of many, are films that almost bludgeoned the charm right out of the guy. In fact, I was ready to write him off, a string of bad performances in forgettable pictures enough to make any fan raise their arms in defeat and relegate the actor to the dustbin.

Well brush off that dust because, based on what is onscreen here, this Diesel is refueled, re-energized and ready to tear up theaters. This is the most charming, complicated, endearing and delightfully self-effacing performances of the actor’s career. DiNorscio isn’t a saint and he’s deeply unapologetic for his numerous sins. But he loves his family, believes in the sanctity of a person’s word and refuses to breakdown no matter what obstacles are laid before him. Diesel makes all these contradictions mesh like fine classical music, the resulting aria an acting tour-de-force worthy of a standing ovation.

Sadly, it is doubtful he will get one. A Lumet movie is not the cause for celebration or the box office guarantee they once were. Finding a studio to release the picture was like pulling teeth, and the fact this film is just now finding distribution is almost a crime in and of itself. The only justice would be for the comedic crime melodrama to become a small word-of-mouth hit. Even if it doesn’t, Lumet can’t hang his head too low. “Find Me Guilty” is a good movie made something nearly more by the astonishing performances, proving that, even in his 80’s, this is one legendary director who still knows a thing or two behind the camera. Here’s hoping audiences take the time to find that fact out.

Film Rating: êêê  (out of 4)