12 Angry Men is a 1997 television film directed by William Friedkin, adapted from the Reginald Rose teleplay of the same title. After the final closing arguments have been presented to the judge, she gives her instructions to the jury. In the United States (both then and now), the verdict in criminal cases (whether guilty or not guilty) must normally be unanimous. A non-unanimous verdict results in a hung jury which in turn forces a mistrial. The question they are deciding is whether the defendant, a teenage boy from a city slum, murdered his father. The jury is further instructed that a guilty verdict will be accompanied by a mandatory death sentence (under current American criminal law, a defendant must first be found guilty or not guilty, and then the jury in the sentencing phase must find an aggravating circumstance to recommend the death penalty, if the state has the death penalty). The jury of twelve retires to the jury room where they begin to become acquainted with each other's personalities and discuss the case. The plot of the film revolves around their difficulty in reaching a unanimous verdict, mainly due to several of the jurors' personal prejudices.