1959 film directed by Richard Fleischer
Compulsion is a 1959 American crime drama film directed by Richard Fleischer, based on the 1956 novel of the same title by Meyer Levin, which in turn is a thinly fictionalized account of the Leopold and Loeb murder trial. The film stars Dean Stockwell and Bradford Dillman as the perpetrators (called Judd Steiner and Artie Straus in the film), and Orson Welles as their defense attorney Jonathan Wilk (based on Clarence Darrow). Diane Varsi, E. G. Marshall, and Martin Milner play supporting roles.
The film was released by 20th Century-Fox on April 1, 1959. It received positive reviews from critics, who singled out the lead performances. At the 1959 Cannes Film Festival, the film was nominated for the Palme d'Or and Welles, Stockwell, and Dillman collectively won the Best Actor Award.
Plot summary adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.