Robert Downey Jr. in recent years is perhaps best known for playing one role over and over again: Robert Downey Jr.

In fact, at one point in The Judge one character actually begs Downey’s lawyer character Hank Palmer to drop the whole ‘hyper-verbal vocabulary vomit’ shtick in a moment which feels very much like an intrusion through the fourth wall: as if the scene were an outtake where the director had simply left the camera to roll whilst one actor made a dig at another. Given the actor’s reluctance to approach a role in any other way (why fix what isn’t broken?) The Judge provides Downey Jr. with a further chance to shine as a slick, fast-talking lady’s man.

The film begins with Hank, upon learning of his mother’s death, returning to his hometown of Carlinville, Indiana where his elderly father Joseph (Robert Duvall) resides as a Judge, practicing law within a community far removed from the high-stake cases his son faces on a day to day basis in Chicago. However, Joseph and Hank don’t exactly meet eye to eye, with Hank telling his own daughter during the film’s opening moments that his father is ‘dead to him.’

Joseph’s health is deteriorating alongside his memory, but this doesn’t keep him from presiding over court cases as he has done his entire career. However, the prompt for the film’s main dramatic arch comes in the form of a hit and run incident which Joseph appears to have perpetrated, the victim being an ex-convict who over two decades ago, Joseph had let walk, only for him to then commit murder. After the ex-con’s blood is found on the judge’s car and there appears to be a clear-cut motive for the crime, Joseph has to fight for his freedom with the help of Hank as his defense lawyer in the same courtroom which had previously been his own.

Whilst the narrative will inevitably close the gap of resentment and bitterness between father and son, reluctantly brought together by the death of the family matriarch but eventually bound by Joseph’s trial, a series of obstacles must first be overcome and unfortunately it feels exactly like that: a series of obstacles to be overcome, introduced one by one and resolved with pin-point accuracy upon the transition from act to act as if being marked off on a ‘How to Structure a Film’ check-list.

Of course, whilst twists and turns keep the narrative moving the film’s real focus is on its performances and particularly that of Duvall as the elderly judge who portrays the vulnerable yet dignified Joseph with a skill honed throughout his extraordinary career. Unfortunately, much like the most prolific films of his past (The Godfather, Apocalypse Now) Duvall is slotted into more of a supporting role opposite Downey Jr. rather than being allowed to take centre stage. We perceive him through Downey Jr.’s character and his estrangement rather than as a person in his own right.

Whilst the supporting performances are top-notch, they don’t quite save the film from its evidently contrived plotting which seems to fluctuate between barely-forgivable kitsch to unforgivable Oscar-baiting tedium.