Kiefer Sutherland Stars In The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial Trailer, William Friedkin's Final Film

The filmmaking legend and one of the last standing titans of New Hollywood, William Friedkin, died last month. Tributes have poured out around the globe in the form of heartfelt open letters from collaborators, unearthed clips from the bombastic director's interviews and home video commentaries, and just about every repertory cinema in the country programming special Friedkin retrospectives. Now, we've gotten our first look at the best thing to remember Friedkin by: his last film.

"The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial" is by this point a classic U.S. text, adapted and re-adapted for the stage and screen numerous times since its original 1951 publication. It originated as a novel called "The Caine Mutiny" by Herman Wouk, and it won its year's Pulitzer Prize. Wouk then adapted the novel into a play in 1953, and it became another smash hit. Charles Laughton directed Peter Fonda in the lead role once it hit Broadway. It has since been adapted into a 1954 film directed by Edward Dmytryk (and featuring an all-star ensemble including Humphrey Bogart, José Ferrer, and Fred MacMurray), a 1955 TV film, and a 1959 play televised for Australian TV.

The story follows the trial of executive officer Stephen Maryk (played in Friedkin's film by Jake Lacy), who's accused of staging a mutiny aboard the USS Caine. The proceeding trial picks apart the psychology of the ship's commander, Philip Francis Queeg (Kiefer Sutherland), who Maryk accused of both tyranny and incompetence, subsequently relieving him of duty with the help of the crew. "There is no greater crime," as the trailer explains, than mutiny. So don't let the fact that the movie takes place entirely in a courtroom fool you.

"Honor and the truth are about to be judged," read the trailer's dramatic intertitles. "The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial" is like a lot of fantastic courtroom dramas, including "Witness for the Prosecution," "Judgment at Nuremberg," and "12 Angry Men," in the way it probes the very depths of human personality, mining up all of its inherent contradictions. The story revolves around Maryk and Queeg, constantly assessing and reassessing who was actually heroic, who was cowardly, and, ultimately, who is guilty.

Friedkin's adaptation is particularly exciting in a lot of ways. Not only is it Friedkin's last film, it's one of the last films to star Lance Reddick, who also died earlier this year. Reddick still has a few more posthoumous releases to go, including the "John Wick" spinoff "Ballerina," starring Ana De Armas, and the Disney+ series "Percy Jackson and the Olympians." For the classic film fans out there, "Caine Mutiny" signals the return of Republic Pictures, the iconic classic-era film studio known for its Westerns, melodramas, and B pictures. Paramount Global revived Republic earlier this year, and "The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial" is its first release.

"The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial" comes to Paramount+ and Showtime on October 6, 2023.