Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner

Coming home to break the big news of an engagement is stressful enough, but in Stanley Kramer’s Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, an emerging social issue was tossed in: interracial marriage.  John (Sidney Poitier) and Joey (Katharine Houghton) hope that the fact that she is white and he is black won’t be a big deal.  As they make their way from the airport, we see that it’s John who is more worried about how Joey’s parents will react to their racial differences.  Joey, young, naive and bubbly, thinks her parents will be fine with it.  After all, they have raised her to be this liberal and accepting.

It turns out, that this idea was better accepted in theory than in practice.  Joey’s mother Christina (Katharine Hepburn) is so excited for her daughter, until she actually gets a look at John.  The shot of her face dropping from happiness to shock is priceless.  When Joey’s father, Matt (Spencer Tracy) comes home, it takes him a moment to realize just what the situation is.  This is his daughter and only child, crushing her love won’t be easy, but when John tells Matt, in confidence from Joey, that he will not marry Joey without his approval, the decision carries even more weight.

As if things were not crazy enough, Joey tells John to invite his own parents over for dinner.  They don’t know that Joey is white and her parents weren’t expecting more guests.  For Tillie (Isabell Sanford), the family’s maid, who also happens to be black and doesn’t approve of John and Joey’s relationship, this is just more work and more racial tensions.  It’s obvious from the start that John doesn’t know how to talk to Tillie, but she’s not afraid to share her low opinion of him.

The best chemistry here, perhaps the best in film history, is between Tracy and Hepburn.  As the aging liberal parents coming face to face with their ideals, they are both gob smacked and confused.  While Christina is slowly being swept up in her daughter’s happiness of new-found love, Matt is looking at the cold facts of their society.  The pressure is on him to decide whether or not to approve of their marriage and he knows the huge obstacles the two will face for the rest of their lives.  What brings him to his final decision is remembering how it was to first fall in love with Christina.  A Tracy/Hepburn film never disappoints, and their final performance together, finished just months beforeTracy’s death is one of the most weighty and poignant of their careers.

Today interracial marriages are much more accepted than they were in 1967.  In recent years, the story has been flipped where the man was white and meeting the girl’s black family.  Unfortunately, 2005’s Guess Who just latched itself to tasteless stereotypes, making Ashton Kutcher a white-boy fish out of water.  Unless you’re into mediocrity, skip that and stay with the original classic.  But I wonder it it’s only a matter of time before this film is revamped for a homosexual couple.  It could be a great modern interpretation, or just another shameless remake with offensive gay jokes.  I think time will tell.

“I don’t think I’m going to faint, but I’ll sit down anyway.”

The Defiant Ones

In 1958, the Civil Rights movement was gaining strength and The Defiant Ones became more fuel for the fire.  Directed by the great Stanley Kramer, the film tells the story of two escaped prisoners chained together and trying to outrun the authorities in the south, one man is black, the other white.  Though it may not have been likely that even this level of integration happened much, if ever, in the south, we accept why these two were chained together in one line, “The warden’s got a sense of humor.”  At first while Noah (Sydney Poitier) and Joker (Tony Curtis) are on the run, the usual black vs white moments come up and Joker seems to think he automatically has say over Noah.  But Noah has equal weight on that chain and doesn’t let Joker push him around.  As their journey wears on, they have to work together and through that they come to understand and respect each other, regardless of skin color.

Growing up on Saturday morning cartoons, I could not help but notice that I’ve seen this plot over and over.  Sometimes it’s a Chinese finger-trap, super-glue or some wayward three-legged race but idea is the same thing:  two uncooperative people stuck together, friction at first, then resolve differences, work together and become friends.  For that basic formula to become a go-to staple for generations, I’m not surprised The Defiant Ones won the Oscar for best original screenplay.

The chemistry between Curtis and Poitier is perfect representation the tension rising in the Civil Rights era.  The way they tug on that chain and bounce anger off one another only slows them down.  The scene where they have to climb out of a deep, muddy hole is the first moments that they really have to work together: if one falls, they both go.  At that point, they aren’t friends yet, but that first step of cooperation is a start.  After the duo is caught trying to steal food in a small town, Joker is threatened with lynching just like Noah and a new foundation of understanding and respect is made.

I watched this film on Turner Classic Movies on Martin Luther King Day and was wondering one thing just before the film started:  Would they edit the N-word?  No, they did not and I was proud.  In today’s world of of constantly making sure we’re politically correct, I find it appalling that people think we need to edit historical literature so that future generations won’t learn such derogatory language.  Don’t get me started on the ignorant people who are messing with Huck Finn.  In a historically accurate film about resolving racial tensions, I find that the use of the word is completely appropriate.  Especially since in 1958, that word was pretty common and less people cared much about any hurt feelings over it.

The Defiant Ones is a smart film that never turns preachy over the subject of race.  It was awarded four acting nominations, including Curtis and Poitier both in the lead actor category.  In fact Sydney Poitier was the first African-American nominated for an acting Oscar at the Academy Awards and would later win for his role in Lilies of the Field.  The Defiant Ones is a great film to kick off Black History Month.

“Ya’ll can’t lynch me! I’m a white man!”