Legal thriller
The legal thriller is a subgenre of thriller and crime fiction in which the major characters are lawyers and their employees. The system of justice itself is always a major part of these works, at times almost functioning as one of the characters. In this way, the legal system provides the framework for the legal thriller much as the system of modern police work does for the police procedural.
Usually, crusading lawyers become involved in proving their cases (usually their client's innocence of the crime of which he is accused, or the culpability of a corrupt corporation which has covered up its malfeasance until this point) to such an extent that they imperil their own interpersonal relationships and frequently, their own lives.
Books
Major authors
Major authors of this genre include Jilliane Hoffman, David Baldacci, William Bernhardt, Jay Brandon, Michael Connelly, William J Coughlin, Marcia Clark, Vish Dhamija, Robert Dugoni, Kenneth G. Eade, Linda Fairstein, Erle Stanley Gardner, Mark Gimenez, James Grippando, John Grisham, Jonnie Jacobs, David Kessler, Lowell B. Komie, William Lashner, John Lescroart, Paul Levine, Phillip Margolin, Steve Martini, Brad Meltzer, John Mortimer, Michael Nava, Perri O'Shaughnessy, Richard North Patterson, Nancy Taylor Rosenberg, Lisa Scottoline, Gianluca Arrighi, Sheldon Siegel, Arthur Train, Scott Turow, and Kate Wilhelm.
Films
| Year | Name | Language |
|---|---|---|
| 1959 | Anatomy of a Murder | English |
| 1985 | Jagged Edge | English |
| 1990 | Presumed Innocent | English |
| 1990 | Mounam Sammadhan | Tamil |
| 1993 | The Firm | English |
| 1993 | The Pelican Brief | English |
| 1993 | Guilty as Sin | English |
| 1994 | The Client | English |
| 1996 | Primal Fear | English |
| 1997 | The Devil's Advocate | English |
| 2002 | High Crimes | English |
| 2003 | Runaway Jury | English |
| 2007 | Michael Clayton | English |
| 2007 | Fracture | English |
| 2011 | The Lincoln Lawyer | English |
| 2013 | Silence | Malayalam |
| 2016 | Manithan | Tamil |
| 2017 | The Third Murder | Japanese |
| 2019 | Section 375 | Hindi |
| 2019 | Dark Waters | English |
| 2020 | Nabab LLB | Bangla |
Video games
Capcom's Ace Attorney is a series of legal thriller adventure video games.
References
Further reading
- Robinson, Marlyn (1998). "Collins to Grisham: A Brief History of the Legal Thriller" (PDF). Legal Studies Forum. 22: 21. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-06-11. Retrieved 2014-01-07.