Editing Judgment at Nuremberg (section)

== Production ==
=== Background ===
The film's events relate principally to actions committed by the German state against its own racial, social, religious, and [[Eugenics|eugenic]] groupings within its  "in the name of the law" (from the prosecution's [[opening statement]] in the film), from the time of Hitler's rise to power in 1933. The plot development and thematic treatment question the legitimacy of the social, political, and alleged legal foundations of these actions.

The real [[Judges' Trial]] focused on 16 judges and prosecutors who served before and during the Nazi regime in Germany, and who embraced and enforced laws&mdash;passively, actively, or both&mdash;that led to judicial acts of [[Compulsory sterilization|compulsory sexual sterilization]] and to the imprisonment and execution of people for their religions, racial or ethnic identities, political beliefs, and physical handicaps or disabilities.

A key thread in the film's plot involves a "[[Rassenschande|race defilement]]" trial known as the ''Feldenstein'' case. In this fictionalized case, based on the real life [[Katzenberger Trial]], an elderly [[Jewish]] man had been tried for having a "relationship" (sexual acts) with an [[Aryan]] (German) 16-year-old girl, an act that had been legally defined as a crime under the [[Nuremberg Laws]], which had been enacted by the German [[Reichstag (Nazi Germany)|Reichstag]]. Under these laws, the man was found guilty and was [[capital punishment|put to death]] in 1942. Using this and other examples, the movie explores individual conscience, [[collective guilt]], and behavior during a time of widespread societal immorality.

The film is notable for its use of [[courtroom drama]] to illuminate individual perfidy and moral compromise in times of violent political upheaval; it was the first mainstream drama film to not shy away from showing actual footage filmed by American and British soldiers after the liberation of the [[Nazi concentration camps]].<ref>{{cite news|first=Susan|last=King|url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-xpm-2011-oct-11-la-et-nuremberg-film-20111011-story.html|title='Judgment at Nuremberg' 50 years later|newspaper=[[Los Angeles Times]]|date=October 11, 2011|accessdate=August 22, 2023}}</ref> Shown in court by [[prosecuting attorney]] Colonel Tad Lawson ([[Richard Widmark]]), the scenes of huge piles of naked corpses laid out in rows and bulldozed into large pits were considered exceptionally graphic for a mainstream film of the time.

According to numerous sources, Tracy's climactic monologue was filmed in one take using several cameras.<ref>{{cite news|first=Martin|last=Chilton|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/monster-mgm-spencer-tracy-toxic-man-hollywood/|title=The monster of MGM: was Spencer Tracy the most toxic man in Hollywood?|newspaper=[[The Daily Telegraph]]|date=April 6, 2020|accessdate=August 22, 2023}}</ref> Clift had trouble remembering his lines, so Kramer told him to do the best he could, correctly figuring that Clift's nervousness would be central to his character's mental state.<ref>{{cite web|first=Brogan|last=Morris|url=https://thequietus.com/articles/29084-film-montgomery-clift-centenary|title=Angel Of Death: Reframing Montgomery Clift At 100|website=[[The Quietus]]|date=October 16, 2020|accessdate=August 22, 2023}}</ref> (Clift was so eager to do the film that he worked just for expenses.<ref>{{cite book|first=Charles|last=Casillo|date=2021|title=Elizabeth and Monty: The Untold Story of Their Intimate Friendship|publisher=Kensington Publishing Corp.|location=New York City|isbn=978-1-4967-2479-3|page=272}}</ref>) Lancaster speaks only three lines (none in the courtroom) until his lengthy monologue roughly 135 minutes into the film. Meanwhile Garland was so happy to be working in a motion picture again after seven years away that it took her a while to get into the proper frame of mind to break down and cry.