In the Heat of the Night

Note - In light of the passing of Mr. Poitier last week this review has been moved up.  Too many legends are leaving us.....

1967's IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT is such an historic, socially significant motion picture that it is easy to overlook its flaws, which, while admittedly minimal are still apparent. I guess I should just get that bit out of the way - for a film that is essentially a mystery, that plot thread is flimsy and ultimately disintegrates into disinterest.  The film's climax involves several participants with fists raised and guns drawn.  One of them is the murderer of an industrialist named Phillip Colbert, who moved his factory from Chicago to a backwater in Mississippi called Sparta.  There in and in the subsequent moments everything is explained.  Meh.  Couldn't Stirling Silliphant have devised something more dramatically interesting? It just feels like dime store potboiler.

But the rest of IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT is aces.  And the mystery ain't what this movie is really about anyway.  Here is a groundbreaking, landmark classic that not only examines prejudice and racism, but also the continuing battle of North versus South.  All that such would imply.  Folks like police chief Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger) certainly don't care how they do things up north, and the fact that a black man from Philadelphia who carries a badge ends up in his town only muddies the sociology.   Perhaps there is also commentary on class warfare.  Maybe I should read John Ball's original novel.

Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) was just passing through town when he is falsely arrested for the murder.  But soon Gillespie is on the phone with Tibbs' superior and a request is made to have the Philly cop help the good ol' boys solve a case.  Nobody wants Tibbs there, including the man himself.  When Colbert's widow (Lee Grant) sees how inept Sparta's finest really are, she threatens to have the factory pull up stakes unless Tibbs remains on the killer's trail.

These Southeners are in the classic mold of distrusting of outsiders.  Especially a Negro.  Civil rights hadn't quite happened yet.   The race war was intensifying.  Tibbs finds himself chased by the locals, ready to lynch him.  Gillespie seems to be more open minded, eventually.  But what choice does he have?  By that final scene, has the man realized that people of color are worthy, too? Or that he was merely out witted by this smart boy from PA?

Director Norman Jewison's IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT always stays just this side of caricature.  The rednecks are painted broadly and perhaps accurately, though not without some dimension.  I liked how the character of Sam Wood (Warren Oates) was drawn, perhaps conflicted about his racism (and a lot more). Tibbs is never portrayed as without flaw himself; a key moment emerges when he flashes with excitement over trapping a suspect into a sure damnation.  "You're just like the rest of us!" beams Gillesepie.

The direction and acting are world class.

Of course the pivot scene unfolds when when Tibbs, who was just slapped by plantation owner Endicott (Larry Gates), slaps back.  It is not merely a moment of melodrama, but rather a long in coming cinematic (and social) response to years of ugly, sweaty bigotry.   The entire film pulses with a nervous energy (with fine editing by Hal Ashby, a disciple of Jewison's) that owes everything to its smoldering indictments and almost nothing to its feeble murder mystery.