SYNOPSIS
Traveling through the Deep South, Homicide Detective Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) ends up becoming involved with a murder investigation in the township of Sparta, Mississippi, clashing with the local town sheriff Police Chief Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger) in charge of the case.
CRITIQUE
In the Heat of the Night was nominated for the 1967 Best Picture alongside Bonnie & Clyde, The Graduate and Guess Who’s Coming for Dinner. (Doctor Dolittle was also nominated that year, but the less said about that travesty of nominating justice the better.) It was, without question, a landmark year, only the third of that additional three not quite standing the test of time to quite the same degree its competition has.
In my opinion, as good as Bonnie & Clyde and The Graduate are (and they are, without question, classics), In the Heat of the Night deserved to win that trophy it took home for Best Picture that year. This is a landmark motion picture, a controlled examination of America at a time of seriously monumental upheaval. Sterling Silliphant’s (Charly) Oscar-winning screenplay is arguably the best of his entire career, while legendary director Norman Jewison (The Hurricane, Fiddler on the Roof) may not have had a finer moment behind the camera then he did here.
Everything about the picture is first-rate. Steiger (that year’s Best Actor winner) tears the screen apart as the bigoted Gillespie, his slow-burn as he realizes both justice must be served and the times are maybe changing for the better (not necessarily in that order) is absolutely dynamic, while Poitier tops him in a performance of such rage, breadth and controlled complexity each time I watch the film I see something different and more amazing emanate out of him.
There is so much more to say but I find myself thinking the best way to experience the film isn’t so much to talk about it as it is to urge people to see it immediately. This is one of the quintessential, one of the prime pieces of American cinema that, like Casablanca or Citizen Kane or 2001: A Space Odyssey or even Bonnie & Clyde and The Graduate, any person even remotely in the art of cinema simply must watch in order to continue their education.
For me, there is a scene (and it isn’t the slap, which is stunning, or the sight of Gillespie carrying Tibbs’ suitcases, which always makes me choke up) that makes this movie the timeless classic which it is. Tibbs goes to a woman known for helping women deal with unwanted pregnancies, and the way he subtly gets the information he needs from her is truly one for the time capsule and the one scene every cops and robbers on television or film since has done their damndest to live up to. It’s unforgettable, much like the rest of the picture, and if I had to compile a list of 100 American motion pictures I think are the best ever made then In the Heat of the Night is one instance where I and the AFI happily agree.
THE VIDEO
In the Heat of the Night is presented in 1.85:1 Widescreen and looks pretty great overall, this 40th Anniversary release of the film noticeably better then the DVD originally put out by MGM a few years ago.
THE AUDIO
Available audio tracks include English Dolby 5.1 Surround, English Mono, Spanish Mono and French Mono with optional English and Spanish subtitles.
THE EXTRAS
The special features here are outstanding.
The retrospective featurettes, “Turning Up the Heat: Movie-Making in the ‘60’s,” “The Slap Heard Around the World” and “Quincy Jones: Breaking New Ground,” are all sensational, while the previously released commentary by Norman Jewison, Lee Grant, Rod Steiger and cinematographer Haskell Wexler ranks right up there with some of the best I have ever heard. Like most MGM releases, the disc also contains the film’s original theatrical trailer.
FINAL THOUGHTS
In the Hear of the Night is a classic. It should be watched over and over again by both film lovers and filmmaker and is an example of dynamic late 1960’s filmmaking indicative of the risk taking of the era and precursor to the even more daring works to come in the next decade. This is a movie to love and, even more importantly, a DVD to own.
