PHOTO BY CLAIRE FOLGER / WARNER BROS.

The strength of “Juror No. 2,” curiously, is how well it overcomes a fundamentally absurd premise. The idea: What if a man were seated for a jury … then realized that he was the real culprit?

If you’re wondering how no one put two and two together before the opening arguments, so am I. And yet the film, directed by nonagenarian Clint Eastwood, overcomes its circumstances to emerge as a compelling, eminently watchable potboiler.

Justin (Nicholas Hoult) and Ally (Zoey Deutch) are tensely awaiting their first child a year after a traumatic miscarriage. As they’re painting the nursery and preparing for a baby shower, Justin is called for jury duty and seated for a homicide case; when a politically aspirant prosecutor (Toni Collette) begins laying out the facts of the case, Justin turns pale.

He was at the roadside bar on the night in question, you see. And while the state is certain that the victim (Francesca Eastwood) was killed by her jilted boyfriend (Gabriel Basso), Justin knows that he hit what he thought was a deer on his way home. Right at the spot where the deceased was found, over the side of a small and narrow bridge.

So yeah: That’s a pickle.

The script, by first-time screenwriter Jonathan Abrams, has to turn cartwheels to keep cornering its characters into moral quandaries. (Kiefer Sutherland turns up a few times just to reiterate the stakes.) But when it’s not justifying its machinations, “Juror No. 2” hooks you in a very direct way. It’s two straight hours of wondering, “Well, what the hell is he going to do now?”

It’s a sort of drama that has all but vanished, at least from the multiplex. (Depressingly, the film just barely appeared in theaters before a streaming pivot.) It’s the advantage of having a filmmaker like Eastwood — whose daughter handles herself well in a small role — still working, even in his 90s; he remembers formats and styles that have always worked, even if they’re not currently in vogue.

The legendary filmmaker has missed on a few recent swings, but “Juror No. 2” is a solid hit; I hope he has more yet to come.

My Rating: 8/10

“Juror No. 2” will begin streaming on Max on Dec. 20.