Inherit the Wind (1960)

The Scopes Monkey Trial was a blockbuster, featuring William Jennings Bryan squaring off against Clarence Darrow, with H.L. Mencken reporting.

“Inherit the Wind” is a slightly fictionalized version. Scopes became Cates; Bryan became Brady; Darrow became Drummond, and H.L. Mencken becomes E.K. Hornbeck.

This is one of those courtroom dramas, like “12 Angry Men,” that has been produced a number of times, all of them pretty damn good.

This version is Stanley Kramer’s landmark 1960 film, starring Frederic March as pious prosecutor Matthew Harrison Brady, and Spencer Tracy as the “agnostic” Drummond. They are both towering actors, with two Oscars each. Gene Kelly proves that he has acting chops, even if he neither sings nor dances.

The people of Hillsboro, Tennessee, are God-fearing, fire-and-brimstone sorts, who hate Drummond and Hornbeck, and the “atheistic science” Mr Cates taught.

The clashes between Brady and Drummond are epic. Truly, Messrs Tracy and March put on a “this is how you do it, you mumbling method-acting chowderheads” seminar. They’re both amazing to watch, as they thunder and froth at one another.

A couple of things bug me about “Inherit the Wind.” First, I disagree with the portrayal of Hillsboro’s townsfolk as being complete simps. Believe me, I’ve been in some small Tennessee towns where I can see them being inhospitable to Yankee agnostics. But Kramer portrays these people as pious to the point of threatening violence…until one day when the great Yankee agnostic changes their minds.

Second, Harry Morgan played the Judge. I like Harry Morgan in many roles, but his Southern accent was all over the place, from Tennessee jurist to Mobile sharecropper to Cajun swamp-dweller. He would have been fine had he not tried an accent at all.

Dick “The First Darrin” York played Cates, the young teacher. He was earnest and believable, but–damn my eyes–I couldn’t help but see him as Darrin.

This is a great courtroom drama, if only for the actors. I also recommend the 1999 version, starring Jack Lemmon and George C Scott. It, too, is an acting seminar. The little things didn’t bug me as much.

It’s too bad Spencer Tracy–the Chief Judge in Stanley Kramer’s “Judgment at Nuremburg”–couldn’t have run this trial as well. Also, too bad Stanley Kramer didn’t make as good a film about Americans as he did about Germans.

Grade: B