drifter51
"Matt and Christina Drayton are shocked when they meet the man who is dating their daughter."
Classic Films of the Silver Screen!
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Matt and Christina Drayton are shocked when they meet the man who is dating their daughter.
-
Nov 21, 2010
- by drifter51
- posted in Classic Silver Screen Film Reviews!
Rating:
"Guess Who's Coming To Dinner" was released back in 1967, the same year that Janice Ian's hit single "Society's Child" was tackling the same thorny issues on your transistor radio. Race relations were a major problem in America in those days. Just a year later, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy would be assassinated and serious race riots would take place in major cities around this nation. Yes, in the culture that was 1967 our society was just beginning to grapple with the issue of race. Stanley Kramer tackles the issue of race head on in "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner". Spencer Tracy (in his final performance) and Katherine Hepburn are elderly parents eagerly looking forward to a dinner-party with their only daughter Joanna (Katherine Houghton) and her new fiancee. She has told them so much about him. What she did not reveal ,however, is that he was black. Sidney Poiter is magnificent in the role of Dr. John Prentice. Well, you could have knocked the Drayton's over with a feather. These "limosine liberals" are suddenly confronted with a situation that hits all too close to home. Looks like it is going to be a very interesting evening at the Drayton house to say the least!
+5
In Tracy and Hepburn, "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner" features two of the brightest stars who ever graced the silver screen. The acting is top notch throughout and the screenplay is wonderful. There is lots of food for thought in this film and one cannot help but wonder how they would react in a similar situation. It would seem to me that as Barack Obama takes his place as our first African-American President it would be an especially good time to take another look at this film. Very highly recommended!
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About the reviewer
Paul Tognetti (drifter51)
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I guess I would qualify as a frustrated writer. My work requires very little writing and so since 1999 I have been writing reviews on non-fiction books and anthology CD's on amazon.com. I never could … more
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About this movie
Guess Who's Coming to Dinner is a 1967 comedy-drama film starring Spencer Tracy, Sidney Poitier, Katharine Hepburn, and Katharine Houghton.
The movie concerns Joanna "Joey" Drayton (Houghton), a young white American woman who has had a whirlwind romance with Dr. John Prentice (Poitier), an African American man she met while on a holiday in Hawaii. Prentice plans to fly to New York later that night then on to an assignment in Switzerland. Joanna plans to join him there soon to be married even though she has only known him for a very short period of time. The plot is centered on Joanna's return to her liberal upper class American home in San Francisco, bringing her new fiance to dinner to meet her parents (Tracy and Hepburn), and the reaction of family and friends.
Guess Who's Coming to Dinner won the Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay for screenwriter, William Rose. Katharine Hepburn also won the Academy Award for Best Actress. The 1967 groundbreaking story dealt with the controversial subject of interracial marriage which had been illegal historically in most of the United States, and was still illegal in 17 Southern U.S. States up until June 12 of that year. Although legalized throughout the U.S. following the Supreme Court decision in Loving v. Virginia, the topic was still taboo in many areas.
According to director Stanley Kramer, he and Rose intentionally debunked ethnic stereotypes; the young doctor, a typical role for the young Sidney Poitier, was ...
Cast:
Katharine Hepburn,
Sidney Poitier,
Spencer Tracy,
Roy E. Glenn, Sr.,
Virginia Christine,
Cecil Kellaway,
Thomas Heaton,
Skip Martin,
John Bear Hudkins,
D'Urville Martin,
Isabel Sanford,
Katharine Houghton,
Grace Gaynor,
Beah Richards,
Alexandra Hay,
Barbara Randolph
Director:
Stanley Kramer
Genre:
Comedy,
Drama
Release Date:
December 12, 1967
MPAA Rating:
Unrated
Screen Writer:
William Rose
Runtime:
108 minutes
Studio:
Columbia Pictures Corporation
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