The tense relationship-often-turned-friendship between a white man and a black man in the deep South of the 1960s is no new plot for a drama of this kind. Movies like Green Book (it was the first off the top of my head) are an unfortunate contribution to this tired genre and at this point, I believe they do absolutely nothing to sway the opinions of stubborn political minds from both sides of the debate. What makes Norman Jewison's In the Heat of the Night so different, however, is the fact that it was actually released in the time period that it was set in. The performances in this movie are incredible, as is the whodunit feel, but what stood out the most to me was how bold these filmmakers were to tell a story like this at that time in America. Despite an obvious lack of production continuity, this film truly sets the standard for how to expertly blend an entertaining story with political and racial themes.
After being wrongfully accused of a wealthy businessman's murder, police detective Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) is assigned to stay in the rural town of Sparta, Mississippi to help solve it. Dealing with the initially prejudiced Chief Gillespie (Rod Steiger) and his police force proves to be a challenge, however, as the two must work together to solve the case. The script of this film, written by Stirling Silliphant and adapted from the novel by John Ball, makes for some of the most interesting scenes. Silliphant was able to very effectively write an engaging whodunit-type film with undertones and clear overtones of how to treat each other as humans. If anything, the treatment of the racial themes throughout this movie was very surface-level. Through dialogue and many tense scenes, this movie comes right off the bat with "hey, racism and prejudice are bad!" While this was the basic, overarching theme, I did really love the subtle interactions that these characters had to really solidify their behavior towards each other. The fact that the police force would much rather defend a white, convicted prisoner than a black, esteemed detective says so much about them, despite being too on-the-nose. Like I had mentioned though, this aspect was still incredibly groundbreaking for the time, providing the audience with something that they never could have expected. In the Heat of the Night very blatantly holds up a mirror to its audience and forces them to re-evaluate their own personal biases and outdated opinions. This seems like it would be frankly basic and lazy writing nowadays, but I can only imagine the impact that this movie had back then.
If not for Poitier and Steiger's performances, this film might not have been as effective as it was. They are both incredibly talented performers and the way that their relationship developed from hostile to comfortably accepting was riveting to see. Again, the development might be a bit cliché at this point, but it was refreshing to see characters such as this eventually get along with each other. Particularly in Poitier's character of Detective Tibbs, as his often withholding and nuanced performance felt so genuine. Even in things that I see today, this unfortunate fear shared between many African-Americans at this time was expressed beautifully by Poitier. His performance also almost invokes a twinge of comedy in his interactions with Gillespie, as he knows that he is clearly able to outsmart this entire town. The aspect of this film that took me out of its environment the most, though, was the tone and Haskell Wexler's cinematography. This entire movie was shot like it was a television cop drama of the time, which is ironic given that this was adapted into a TV show for an entire 8 seasons in 1988. Many of the shots felt too close or had too much zoom and was not really able to translate what the scene was trying to convey. Feeling like an episode of television really brought me out of the story, along with how mismatched many of the scenes were. This film could not quite decide whether it was a more stoic drama or a lighthearted look into the two protagonists' relationship and Jewison's direction fails to distinguish between the two. Despite the way this movie was made, however, as it ended up as a bit of a tonal mess, Jewison is able to tell such an efficient and interesting story.
In the Heat of the Night is an incredible story that almost comes off as dangerous for these filmmakers to tell in this era. While I did not necessarily enjoy how this movie was shot or even presented, thankfully the writing and performances bring enough to the table to make this film very enjoyable. Paired with its titular theme song from Ray Charles and this movie proves itself to be a very engaging classic.
My Rating: ★★★½
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