
            New Yorkers Billy Gambini (Ralph Macchio) and his friend Stan Rothenstein (Mitchell Whitfield) stop at a convenience store called the Sack-O-Suds in fictional Beechum County, Alabama. The two are heading to college in Los Angeles and decided to take a longer road trip out there through the Deep South. At the store, they accidentally neglect to pay for a can of tuna. After they leave the store, the clerk is shot and killed off-camera, and Billy and Stan, who match the descriptions of the murderers given by witnesses, are then pulled over and detained in connection with the murder. Due to circumstantial evidence and a series of miscommunications based on the boys assumption that they have merely been detained for shoplifting, Billy ends up being charged with murder, and Stan is charged as an accessory.The pair call Billy's mother, who tells her son that there is an attorney in the family, Billy's cousin, Vincent LaGuardia "Vinny" Gambini (Joe Pesci), who travels to Beechum County accompanied by his fiancée, Mona Lisa Vito (Marisa Tomei). Unfortunately, although he is perfectly willing to take the case, Vinny reveals himself to be a neophyte personal injury lawyer from Brooklyn, New York, newly admitted to the bar (after six attempts and six years) with no trial experience whatsoever.Although Vinny manages to fool the suspicious and conservative trial judge, Chamberlain Haller (Fred Gwynne), about being experienced enough to take the case, his ignorance of basic court procedures and abrasive, disrespectful attitude towards the judge gets him into trouble immediately. During the arraignment, Vinny has no idea what he's supposed to do and angers Judge Haller with his ignorance of whether or not to plead "guilty" or "not guilty" for Stan and Billy. Vinny is charged with contempt of court, fined and sent to jail with Billy and Stan, who both believe that Vinny is incapable of handling their case.The next day, Vinny's ignorance and inexperience causes more harm, much to Billy and Stan's consternation. Vinny does not even bother to cross-examine any of the witnesses in the probable cause hearing. As their claims go unquestioned, it appears that the stuffy prosecutor, District Attorney Jim Trotter III (Lane Smith), has an airtight case that will inevitably lead to a conviction at the trial. After Vinny's poor showing at the hearing, Billy and Stan decide to fire him and use the public defender, but Vinny asks for one more chance to prove himself. He talks to Billy alone and explains that Trotter's case looks airtight but is actually very flimsy -- Vinny gravely tells his cousin that nobody can fool a Gambini so easily.Vinny spends several weeks preparing his defense: he questions all of the witnesses about what they allegedly saw and learns (with Lisa's help) that he is entitled to examine every file that Trotter has prepared. A running gag has Vinny unable to get much sleep because noise from trains, local factories and, when Trotter offers the use of his hunting cabin, the sounds of the forest keep him awake as well.The trial then opens with Vinny representing his cousin and the public defender representing Stan. Despite some further missteps, including wearing a gaudy secondhand suit to court (as his own suit fell in the mud) and sleeping through Trotter's opening statement, Vinny shows that he can make up for his ignorance and inexperience with an aggressive, perceptive questioning style. While the public defender stutters through a line of ill-prepared questions that appears to bolster the case against the boys, Vinny quickly and comprehensively puts into question the testimony of the first witness Sam Tipton (Maury Chaykin) who testifies seeing Bill and Stan arrive at the Sac-O-Suds parking lot before he started cooking his breakfast grits and saw them flee from the scene after hearing a gunshot. Vinny is able to show that 20 minutes had actually passed between those two events, not the five minutes that Tipton claims, thus opening the door to the idea that there may have been two cars involved and possibly two other suspects. Billy's faith is rewarded, and Stan develops newfound respect and confidence for Vinny, firing the public defender.The next day, Vinny's cross-examinations of the remaining eyewitnesses are similarly effective. The elderly Mrs Riley (Paulene Myers)'s testimony becomes suspect because she could not identify how many fingers Vinny was holding up at half the distance she had been from the getaway car -- Vinny tests her vision in the courtroom and very respectfully informs her that she didn't see the suspects. Redneck Ernie Crane's (Raynor Scheine) testimony is made to question his own identification of the "two men in a green convertible" when he was forced to realize that he had made it looking through a dirty window, a rust-covered screen, a bunch of leaf-covered trees, and seven bushes on his property.But on the third day of the trial, Trotter produces a surprise witness, George Wilbur, an FBI analyst who testifies that his chemical analysis of the tire marks left at the crime scene shows that they are identical to the tires on Billy's 1964 Buick Skylark, which are a popular-selling model of Michelins. With only a brief recess to prepare his cross-examination and unable to come up with a particularly strong line of questions, Vinny becomes frustrated and lashes out at Lisa by taunting her about the usefulness of her wide-angle photographs of the tire tracks. She storms out, leaving Vinny alone.However, Vinny later realizes that the photo the two had argued over actually holds the key to the case: the flat and even tire marks going over the curb reveal that Billy's car could not have been used for the getaway. Vinny needs Lisa, an expert in automobiles from working in her father's auto garage and who has several relatives who do the same work, to testify to his theory. He drags her into court, and during Vinny's questioning, they patch up their differences.Vinny asks Lisa if his case "holds water". After looking over the photo, she has the same epiphany as Vinny and tells the court he Buick had an axle that connected the two wheels, and would make a tilted, not flat, impression of the lower tire when going over the curb. The tire marks are both flat, revealing the car that made the marks had both Posi-traction and an independent wheel suspension system. Lisa concludes that the car that made the tracks could have been one of only two models: the Chevrolet Corvette -- immediately disproved by Lisa because it bears no resemblance to the car involved in the robbery/murder -- or a 1964 Pontiac Tempest, a car with approximately the same size and general appearance as Billy's '64 Buick Skylark. Lisa also confirms that both cars were available with the same metallic mint green paint job produced by General Motors, further bolstering Vinny's case. Vinny recalls the FBI expert who also backs Lisa's testimony.Finally, Vinny calls the local sheriff, who has run a records check at Vinny's request. The sheriff testifies that two men resembling Billy and Stan were arrested a few days earlier in Georgia for driving a stolen Pontiac Tempest and who were in possession of a .357 pistol, the same caliber used to kill the Sack O' Suds clerk. Trotter then respectfully moves to dismiss all the charges.Throughout the film, Vinny and Judge Haller play a game of cat-and-mouse over Vinny's qualifications. Haller first discovers that, despite Vinny's claims that he tried "quite a few" murder cases, there exist no records of anybody named Vincent Gambini trying any case in New York State. Aware that Judge Haller will not let him be Stan and Billy's legal council if he finds Vinny to be inexperienced, Vinny then begins a series of lies by claiming that he had his name changed during a previous career as a stage actor and continued to use the name when he opened a law practice. Vinny, believing that he should give the judge the name of someone with the kind of resume he claimed to have, supplies the name of a prominent New York attorney, Jerry Gallo. Unfortunately, Lisa later tells Vinny that Gallo passed away the previous week, and when Haller learns this, Vinny claims that Haller misheard "Gallo" when Vinny actually said "Callo". Finally, Lisa gets Vinny off the hook by calling his mentor, Judge Malloy from New York, who responds to Haller's request by claiming that 'Jerry Callo' has a long and impressive trial history.The film concludes with Haller apologizing for doubting Vinny and praising his skills as a litigator. Vinny and Lisa then drive off together, discussing how they were able to fool the judge about Vinny's qualifications and arguing about plans for their wedding.
    

My Cousin Vinny


            
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Mitchell Whitfield

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