DAVID GREENE, HOST:
Believe it or not, it has been 25 years since a hapless leather-jacketed lawyer from New York showed up in an Alabama courtroom.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MY COUSIN VINNY")
JOE PESCI: (As Vinny Gambini) My clients are...
FRED GWYNNE: (As Judge Chamberlain Haller) What are you wearing?
PESCI: (As Vinny Gambini) Huh.
GWYNNE: (As Judge Chamberlain Haller) What are you wearing?
PESCI: (As Vinny Gambini) I'm wearing clothes.
GREENE: That is Joe Pesci as Vinny Gambini making a terrible first impression on a tough judge in the film "My Cousin Vinny."
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
It might surprise you to learn that lawyers love this movie about a lawyer who doesn't know what he's doing. It turns out the film is a good educational tool.
ELIZABETH BURCH: Unlike a lot of different legal movies, they took care to actually get the law right, so you can use it as a way to illustrate how trials actually work.
GREENE: That is Elizabeth Burch. She teaches law at the University of Georgia, and she uses "My Cousin Vinny" in her classes.
BURCH: You have this bumbling guy from New York who comes down and is in rural Alabama and completely out of his element. And, you know, I think a lot of students feel that way, too, particularly in their first year of law school.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MY COUSIN VINNY")
MARISA TOMEI: (As Mona Lisa Vito) He has to show you everything, otherwise it could be a mistrial. He has to give you a list of all his witnesses. You can talk to all his witnesses. He's not allowed any surprises. They didn't teach you that in law school either?
INSKEEP: Marisa Tomei there is Vinny's fiance, Mona Lisa Vito, teaching him about legal procedure.
PATRICK KRECHOWSKI: There's a lot of that movie that just hits home for attorneys.
INSKEEP: Patrick Krechowski is city attorney Neptune Beach, Fla. and also works as an adjunct professor, who shows his students examples of Vinny Gambini's ethics or lack of ethics.
KRECHOWSKI: You know, lying to the judge about his experience and his name - and even if Vinny had lost the case, those two defendants never would have faced the death penalty. That case would have been overturned on appeal in a heartbeat.
GREENE: Two lawyers and, believe it or not, two fans of the film "My Cousin Vinny," which was released 25 years ago today. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.