Best Picture Sunday #4: In the Heat of the Night (1967)

Something about In the Heat of the Night, released in 1967 and winner of the 40th Academy Award for Best Picture, makes it feel special. An inexplicable something. The film is a hybrid of mystery, buddy cop and social issues drama and the plot is a familiar one – in spirit if not in particulars. 

In Sparta, Mississippi – a fictional town – a wealthy industrialist is murdered. Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier), a police officer from Philadelphia, is passing through town that night – though limiting his stay in Sparta to the train station – and is immediately accused of the murder. After proving his innocence, Tibbs is drawn into the murder investigation in uneasy alliance with the local chief of police Gillespie (Rod Steiger). 

The film is a restrained one, in almost every respect. There’s little that could be called action, any potential action – fights, pursuits – are quickly, almost anti-climatically resolved. This lack of action, always so quickly resolving in favour of the police, completely works in context: a primary conflict of the film is not whether someone will be charged with the murder, but whether that person will be the murderer. 

Tibbs is immediately pegged as a “good suspect” because he is black and – from the perspective of the Spartans – a drifter. Yet while the townspeople – and the chief – definitely are bigoted, Tibbs’ initial treatment seems as symptomatic of poor policework as racism. Tibbs does not only represent Gillespie’s reckoning with the subject of race but also his introduction to modern policing. Though the film never strays far from its central mystery, it is the dynamics of Tibbs and Gillespie that dominate.

Both racism and antiquated policing are arguably caused by the same thing: ignorance. The cure for both is exposure and education. If there is a message to In the Heat of the Night, it comes from that Tibbs-Gillespie dynamic and how it changes, and the message is that ignorance can be defeated. Gillespie repeatedly, in part due to the political pressure attached to solving the murder, wants to pin it on anyone who “could be” the killer. Despite that, though, he does, if reluctantly, yield to Tibbs’ expertise (and Tibbs is a homicide expert). 

Rod Steiger’s portrayal of chief Gillespie won him his leading actor Oscar. He’s a fully realised and nuanced character. Gillespie would have been an easy character to make wholly unlikable and he is surprisingly often the foil to his “buddy cop” Tibbs. But he’s not wholly unlikable. Gillespie more than anything else just seems human, his motives are acceptable even when his actions are not. As the film progresses, the political pressure to find the killer grows, as does the threat to Tibbs’ life. 

Sidney Poitier is perfect in the role of Mr. Tibbs. Poitier, in keeping with the rest of the film, brings a restraint, almost to the point of stoicism, to the role. Almost. Though he quietly and calmly explains why he is not the killer at the film’s start, Poitier’s eyes shine with pain and indignation at the accusation and its cause. When, throughout the film, he is discriminated against, he does not rage but accepts it with (I think) a bemused resignation. Tibbs is used to it and does not believe things can change. 

Tibbs is far from perfect himself. His belief that things can’t change is rooted in his own prejudice, a prejudice challenged by his partnership and borderline friendship with Gillespie. Tibbs is at the centre of the film’s two best known moments. The first, “They call me Mister Tibbs”. Second, the retaliatory slapping of wealthy industrialist, Endicott. It’s a slap with consequences, the people won’t be happy and Gillespie tells Tibbs he’ll have to leave Sparta and the case. Tibbs is furious, he can, he’s sure, get Endicott for the murder. Tibbs had pegged Endicott – as a rival industrialist of the victim and a man with a cotton field – as a “good suspect”. At this moment, directly after the slap, Gillespie has a realisation: “You’re just like the rest of us, ain’t ya?” Seeing that Gillespie is not wrong, Tibbs is wounded. 

The pacing of the film is relaxed and devotes plenty of time to its characters, both the main pair and side characters. Though the body of the victim is found at the “start”, it is only after we have accompanied a police officer on his patrol through the streets – with some stops that take on a significance later, when Tibbs asks this officer to retrace his route. The staff at the police station provide some light humour, while the citizens of Sparta provide the “political” background to the mystery: the industrialist’s widow, who wants Tibbs on the case; the mayor, who just wants the case solved; a mob, who increasingly want Tibbs out of town. 

As I said earlier, as the film goes on, and Tibbs’ continued presence in the town becomes less tenable, the tension becomes whether the crime will eventually be blamed on the culprit or an innocent. Only Tibbs is capable of solving the crime with accuracy – as Gillespie admits: “I’m not an expert” – but will he have the time to do so? 

I think In the Heat of the Night was a fantastic film – I watched it twice. Its restraint gives it a real down-to-earthness, the performances and characters are compelling, and it has that elusive quality – do films have texture? – that make it feel different from other movies, even similar ones. The film’s positive message seems to me more than just ignorance can be overcome; it’s that it will be overcome, just as Tibbs’ is resigned to present discrimination, Gillespie and the others must resign themselves to looming changes (or welcome those changes). 

So that’s some quick thoughts on In the Heat of the Night, which won, in addition to Best Picture and Leading Actor, Oscars for Adapted Screenplay, Sound and Editing (by Hal Ashby, director of Harold and Maude). Norman Jewison was nominated for, but did not win, Best Director.

I’m playing catch up with my Best Picture Sunday posts. This one should have been posted in the last week of February. Up next, today or tomorrow, is 1955’s Marty. Thanks for reading. What do you think of In the Heat of the Night?