VIn Diesel premieres new court room drama

BERLIN - Sidney Lumet said he overcame snobbery about action heroes to cast Vin Diesel as the star defendant in the longest U.S. federal criminal trial for "Find Me Guilty," which premiered Thursday at the Berlin International Film Festival. Diesel, who starred in "XXX" and "The Pacifier," plays Giacomo "Jackie" DiNorscio, who defended himself in the 21-month trial in Newark, N.J. The trial ended in August 1988 with the acquittal on racketeering charges of DiNorscio and 19 other alleged mobsters. "We're all, and I include myself in this, big snobs about action heroes, we relegate them," Lumet told reporters. "It's what we used to do with beautiful acresses ... if you're an action hero and a star it means you cannot act - and all of this despite the fact that we know different." The film draws on dialogue from the original trial with DiNorscio, age 47 at the time of his acquittal, stealing the show - punctuating the proceedings with one-liners that kept the courtroom laughing. He was serving a prison sentence for an earlier conviction at the time. [ACP]