Inherit the Wind (1960). Photofest.
(Stanley Kramer, US 1960, 128 min., 35mm)
Senior Matinee—Free for 55+. Closely based on the Scopes “Monkey” Trial of 1925, Inherit the Wind relates the sensational trial of a young teacher, Bertram Cates (Dick York), who is prosecuted for teaching Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution in a high school science class—a violation of state law. Three-time presidential candidate Matthew Brady (Fredric March) is the prosecutor pitted against the controversial and brilliant Henry Drummond (Spencer Tracy) as Cates’s defense lawyer in a rhetorical battle between fundamentalism and science, while influential newspaperman E. K. Hornbeck (Gene Kelly) of the Baltimore Sun gives the case national coverage. Released during the McCarthy era, Inherit the Wind provided a means to critique the present through history; it remains one of director Stanley Kramer’s most relevant and most controversial films.