Customer Reviews

Inherit the Wind

5 star:		(97)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

There are many reasons to watch this movie, one of the essential films of the past 50 years. But the primary motivation is to see the greatest screen actor of all, Spencer Tracy, deliver a performance for the ages. Watch this master emote with movement, voice and nuance. He steals the picture (as he usually does), but there is another brilliant performance as well. This is delivered expertly by the underrated Fredric March, in one of the meatiest roles ever handed to an actor. March is at turns witty, cunning, over-the-top, hammy or contrite, depending upon the demands of the scene. His scenes on the witness stand with Tracy are among the best written and beautifully acted pieces in movie history. It's impossible not to be on the edge of your seat as Tracy quizzes March about various passages from the Bible.

I won't bother with the details of the plot, which is well known to most movie fans. Don't expect real or truthful history, and accept that Kramer's direction is sometimes limited and even claustrophobic. Watch this film because there has never been such an array of spellbinding performances as were delivered by Tracy and March. An astounding display of acting talent.

Inherit the Wind is a movie about ideas, and in the hands of master actors like Spencer Tracy and Fredric March, the ideas are well delivered. March and Tracy bring the full force of their talents to their roles as opposing lawyers (and one time friends) who face off on the issue of evolution vs. Creation. The fact that this is based on a real life court case only adds to the drama. Florence Eldridge, March's real life wife, is excellent as March's movie wife who recognizes the flaws in her husband, but loves and admires him anyways. Harry Morgan also gives a solid performance as the judge caught in a very controversial case. Gene Kelly plays a very cynical reporter and has some good scenes, but overall isn't completely effective. The movie is full of dialogue, and is obviously based on a stage play, but the ideas are so strong, the actors so dynamic, and there are enough scenes away from the court case, so that the movie doesn't drag. And of course, the issues raised about freedom of speech and thought are still relevant today. This is a movie and a story to learn from.

INHERIT THE WIND was released in 1960, yet remains as topical today as it did all those decades ago. Stanley Kramer's masterpiece depicting the volatile clash of science and religion continues to spawn discussion and debate.

Based in part on the actual 1925 Scopes "Monkey Trial" in Tennessee, INHERIT THE WIND is dominated by its two co-stars, Spencer Tracy and Fredric March. Both actors give stellar performances as courtroom antagonists who once were close friends. Gene Kelly strayed from his usual role--playing the lead in musicals--to portray a cynical newspaper reporter, and he pulls it off remarkably well. The entire cast is first-rate, exceptional.

Faith and religion are at the core of human emotion; INHERIT THE WIND taps in to this emotion, spilling and dispersing it throughout the film. Gripping courtroom drama, fierce debates, ugly namecalling and bigotry, and tender human compassion are manifested again and again. The fabric of "interpretation" is woven into the story, very gently suggesting that in order to grow as a society we must challenge that which is taken for granted, be it Creationism or evolution. We must continue to ask questions, no matter how uncomfortable the answers may make us.

This is a superb film. I cannot recommend it more highly.

Most of the serious criticism of this film has focused on its "massive deviation from fact", changing the facts "to suit the message" and so on. But everyone knows no dramatization can be perfectly accurate--no one would criticize "Julius Caesar" or "Richard III" on this account, or, to use more modern examples, "The Crucible" or "Judgment at Nuremberg". Nevertheless, films should be held accountable for severe falsification if they claim to be accurate, or could even be reasonably mistaken for reenactments. "Inherit the Wind" falls into this second category for reasons I'm not totally clear about--even though it's clearly a piece of advocacy and terribly partial to the defense.

But is it really so inaccurate? Have a look at the transcripts and you'll see that there's a great deal taken verbatim from them. The context of the trial, the carnival atmosphere, the (irrelevant) ulterior motives of certain participants, the partiality of judge and jury, were all attested to, and not contradicted in any important way by every source I looked at.

It was after reading H. L. Mencken's original dispatches from Dayton, Tennessee that I began to understand what the real problem was. It's quite simple really. Religion, alone of all powerful social institutions, claims to be immune from criticism. We are so used to tiptoeing around the subject that flat-out public criticism of religion has become unthinkable, and any sort of behavior in its defense, including violence, understandable if not actually justified.

"Inherit the Wind" doesn't go out of its way to find excuses for these people--ignorance, viciousness, prejudice and superstition are depicted in all their hideousness. What shocks me is that this picture, corny and dated as it is in places, should now be seen as so "out of line". You wouldn't think people who are comfortable with hell-fire and God's wrath, or with amputations and beheadings, would be so thin-skinned. But there you have it. And it's getting worse.

With the issue of evolution versus creationism flaring up anew in current legal battles, Stanley Kramer's 1960 film has retained its timeliness. This was a period of vigorous activity for Kramer on the message film front as he directed and produced within a four year cycle "The Defiant Ones," a 1958 examination of the race issue in America starring Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis, "On The Beach," a controversial film about nuclear war starring Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner which was released in 1959, followed in turn by the aforementioned "Inherit The Wind" one year later and the highly acclaimed "Judgment at Nuremberg" in 1961, which focused on personal responsibility of German judges to interpret the law humanely during Hitler's Third Reich.

"Inherit The Wind" was adapted by Kramer to the screen from the hugely successful Broadway stage hit written by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee about the Scopes Monkey Trial held in Dayton, Tennessee in 1922. While the names were changed, with defense lawyer Clarence Darrow becoming Henry Drummond and prosecutor William Jennings Bryan becoming Matthew Harrison Brady, the chief issue of the actual trial pitting creationism and evolution as applied to the classroom remained intact. Distinguished veteran stars Spencer Tracy and Fredric March perform with astounding brilliance as competing individuals who believed they were standard bearers for important causes governing how civilization would proceed. March stood foursquare for a Biblical foundation based on old line religious values, which he believed were threatened by free thinkers of the agnostic stripe represented by Tracy, who in turn thought his adversary's ideas antiquated and anti-intellectual. Gene Kelly emerges in a different type of role from his usual delightful free spirit as highly cynical newspaper columnist E.K. Hornbeck, in actuality H.L. Mencken, like Drummond-Darrow an agnostic free thinker whose newspaper, The Baltimore Sun, put up the money to pay Clarence Darrow's legal fee in the Scopes Trial.

Great supporting efforts are provided by Florence Eldridge, March's real life wife, who plays his supportive spouse in the film, by Dick York playing the Scopes role of town high school biology teacher, and Harry Morgan as trial judge. Donna Anderson, used by Kramer to good advantage as Anthony Perkins' wife in "On The Beach," does a convincing job as wife of York.

First, I have to dispel some of the myths about the movie purported not only by reviewers on this site, but mainstream film reviewers and social commentators.

1. It's true that a consortium of Dayton (Hillsboro) businessmen hired Scopes (Cates) to 'take the fall' because it would mean a boon to the local economy, but there were also a number of people opposed to the teaching of evolution that thought the trial was a sham and let it be known. The insults and threats were hurled from both sides. The film is a dramatization from Cates and Drummond's point of view. The threats and intimidation are shown to make Cates a sympathetic character and present him in the light of an underdog with the world against him. To quote Matthew Harrison Brady, "If St. George had killed a dragonfly instead of a dragon, who would remember him?"

2. Also, "...Young Earthism wasn't a factor in the Scopes trial."

Here is the direct transcript from Day 7 of the Scopes trial (Darrow examines Bryan):
Q--Have you any idea how old the earth is?
A--No.
Q--The Book you have introduced in evidence tells you, doesn't it?
A--I don't think it does, Mr. Darrow.
Q--Let's see whether it does; is this the one?
A--That is the one, I think.
Q--It says B.C. 4004?
A--That is Bishop Usher's calculation.
Q--That is printed in the Bible you introduced?

A--Yes, sir....
Q--Would you say that the earth was only 4,000 years old?
A--Oh, no; I think it is much older than that.

Q--How much?
A--I couldn't say.
Q--Do you say whether the Bible itself says it is older than that?
A--I don't think it is older or not.

The point of Darrow's (Drummond's) cross-examination was not whether or not the earth is 6000 or 6,000,000 years old, but to get Bryan (Brady) to admit the possibility that there may be inaccuracies in the Bible (exactly the same thing Scopes did).

3. "In court transcripts, the evolutionists open (openly?) spoke of their racist views...". I can't find anything to support or refute this statement. In fact, the Judge excluded all expert testimony relating to the origin of man and life (both in the film and trial). If that's the case, then the only racist statements that could be entered would be by Darrow or Scopes or by prosecution witnesses. Check out Drummond's speech about "...turning Catholic against Protestant and Protestant against Protestant". It's Darrow's speech nearly word for word and shows the feelings of the man. It's hard to believe that he would have approved of the Third Reich after hearing or reading this.

4. "The evolutionists won the court case. False. They lost". I have to wonder if the reviewer watched the end of the movie. SPOILER: Cates and Drummond do lose the case. Cates is fined $100 and Drummond says that they have no intention of paying and will challenge the ruling.

The Final Verdict: Like any movie "Based on a True Story", Inherit the Wind is bound to stir up controversy over whether or not it really happened that way.

Stephen King once wrote a review of "The Amityville Horror" in which he said that the mere medium of film makes the story fiction and not fact. That's the case here. Inherit the Wind is written from a certain point of view (just like this review, and the review before mine, and the review before that) and points of view are just that -- points of view.

As for the movie itself, what more can be said? The non-trial dialogue is crisp and brilliant (Kelly's line to the woman who offers him a nice, clean place to stay always brings a smile to my face). March and Tracy are appropriately titanic in the courtroom and low-key in the rest (the porch scene, specifically). Stanley Kramer's direction is spot-on, getting close-ups at the right time and pulling back to reveal the packed courtroom at others (look for the canted and off-center frames during the prayer meeting).

The DVD looks just fine, preserving the aspect ratio is very important to a film like Inherit the Wind which uses the frame to tell a story. I could have used some extras (comparison of the real life trial and the movie). The extas are a minor point, though, the film is enough.

Inherit the Wind is a brilliant film based on a brilliant play based on a factual trial between two brilliant legal minds. That is all that I, as a viewer, can ask.

Inherit the Wind is the broad fictional adaptation of the real-life Scopes Monkey Trial in which John Scopes, a football coach who taught evolution in a high school classroom, was put on trial and the city of Dayton, Tennessee was put on the map... and not in a particularly pleasing light.

Spencer Tracy and Frederic March turn out tremendously powerful performances as opposing lawyers in the trial, while Gene Kelly stands aloofly by as a flippant reporter for the Boston Globe.

What is especially striking about Inherit the Wind is the relevance of the movie (almost 50 years later) to the current political atmosphere. In the 20's the law said that evolution couldn't be taught, and now it's creationism that can't be taught. As Tracy's Henry Drummond says in the film, "Well, that's evolution for you."

The acting throughout the film is outstanding and it hardly feels like a two hour film, particularly in black and white. The entire film builds momentum until it all comes to a head at the very end with the showdown between Drummond (Tracy) and Brady (March). This is not a film to be missed if you're at all interested in history (although it's a loose adaptation) and the current intelligent design debate.

Included on the disc is the original trailer for the film, which features a few clips from the film and then director Stanley Kramer discussing the film and listing awards that it won in festivals. It's interesting to see a trailer this old and compare it to our current trailers.

Stanley Kramer's spellbinding film features a deft performance by Tracy as the rumpled, deceptively plain-spoken Drummond (modeled on Clarence Darrow), matched by March's larger than life, virtuoso turn as Matthew Brady (based on William Jennings Bryan). Just sit back, pretend you're sitting in that humid courtroom, and watch two old pros at work. You'll re-live history. Also look for Gene Kelly in one of his only serious, non-dancing roles as a cynical journalist based on H.L. Mencken.

In 1955, playwrites Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee published their play, Inherit the Wind, in response to the anti-Communist lynch-mob mentality of the post-WWII/Korea era. Based in part on the historical events of the 1925 Scopes "Monkey" Trial in Dayton, Tennessee, Lawrence and Lee delved into the questions of tryanny by the majority and mob rule through the dramatization of the week-long "circus" surrounding the trial. The subsequent faithful screen adaptation of the story in 1960 employed not only the explosive dialogues and confrontations of hypocracy of the play but also employed the magnificent performances of acting legends Spencer Tracy and Fredric March. Portraying, respectively, rumpled and disheveled defense attorney Henry Drummond (Clarence Darrow in the real-life trial) and the religious populist and volunteer prosecutor Matthew Harrison Brady (William Jennings Bryan), this film adaptation grips the imagination and leaves viewers emotionally and physically grasped by the courtroom proceedings and by the various confrontations between the old world that was and the new world that was coming. This film is as compelling today and perhaps moreso than it was when it was first released. Anyone wanting to enjoy two bravura performances of two of America's truly great actors is encouraged to set aside a couple of well-spent hours to watch and experience this film.

As previous reviewers have noted, _INHERIT THE WIND_ is a work of fiction that is based on what came to be known as "The Scopes Monkey Trial." Also previously noted is the fact that Spencer Tracy, as Henry Drummond, the character adapted from the real life Clarence Darrow, and Frederic March, playing the role of Matthew Harrison Brady, whose character is based on William Jennings Bryan, engage in a carefully choreographed and outstandingly acted "pas de deux" that, to this day, has rarely been matched in any movie.

It should be understood that this is a work of fiction, and is not meant to duplicate the facts of the Scopes trial. That's why the names have been changed -- to allow literary license for dramatic purposes.

With this as background, one needs to understand the political climate that prevailed when the play from which the movie was adapted was written. The play was written in 1950, in the middle of what has come to be known as the "McCarthy Era." The anti-Communist hysteria of the time was seen by many as a threat to intellectual freedom. It was politically dangerous, at that time, to directly take on those threats to freedom of ideas, so the playwrites (Jerome Lawrence and Robert Lee) came up with the idea of using the Scopes Trial, which was safely in the past, as a vehicle to express the importance of the constitutional guarantees of such things as freedom of speech. That the play they wrote in 1950, and its 1960 movie version, were of such dramatic intensity was just icing on the cake.

I think that looking at _INHERIT THE WIND_ from the standpoint of historical perspective should do away with some reviewers beliefs that it is some sort of atheistic plot to challenge their belief systems. Also, repeating myself, I believe that it is important to realize that it is a work of fiction and need not accurately reflect the details of the real trial.

It's worth seeing from several perspectives. As a well acted movie; as one that creates an atmosphere that makes the viewer feel that he is in that hot, humid courtroom; and as one that expresses how important our freedoms really are.