MY EARLIER POST about films in law school classes led to requests for more. Trouble is, I don’t show films much.

However, some years ago I did use Talk of the Town as a dialogue on legal realism versus legal formalism — which is, in fact, its subject. (Someone once told me that Fred Rodell was involved in it somehow, though there’s nothing about that in the credits.) It’s a good movie, but as I say, the amount of class time that movies take up makes me reluctant to use them much.

UPDATE: My former colleague Peter Morgan used to show The Verdict in his Legal Ethics class, and ask the students to spot all the ethical violations, and felonies, committed by the Paul Newman character. It’s a rather large number. And reader Scott Holmes emails that he wishes he’d seen A Civil Action before going into law practice as a personal injury lawyer: “I thought this movie showed most accurately what brutal frustration one faces as a trial lawyer. If I taught, this would be shown on my first day of class.”

And reader Daniel Phillips emails:

You may want to refer people interested in movies for law school classes to TaxProfBlog (Prof. Paul Caron). I had him this semester, and he is well known around school to show movie clips (usually just a minute or two) to reinforce his point and make a dull subject more interesting. One example: when we were studying deductions for work clothing, we went over a case with one of the girls from Fleetwood Mac. She claimed a deduction for clothing based on her excessive sweating, she could only wear it once. Prof. Caron then showed a clip of her performing.

Now there’s a treat!