The Defiant Ones

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Eye Filmmuseum

7 February Eye is closed

Eye Filmmuseum seen across the river IJ © Marcus Koppen

Eye Filmmuseum, © Marcus Koppen

still from Buck and the Preacher (Sidney Poitier, US 1971)

still Buck and the Preacher (Sidney Poitier, US 1971)

still from Cry Freedom (Richard Attenborough, GB/ZW 1987)

still Cry Freedom (Richard Attenborough, GB/ZW 1987)

still from Lilies of the Field (Ralph Nelson, US 1963)

still Lilies of the Field (Ralph Nelson, US 1963)

poster The Defiant Ones (Stanley Kramer, US 1958)

still from The Defiant Ones (Stanley Kramer, US 1958)

still The Defiant Ones (Stanley Kramer, US 1958)

still from In the Heat of the Night (Norman Jewison, US 1967)

still In the Heat of the Night (Norman Jewison, US 1967)

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Sidney Poitier shows in his comic version of the classic Western that the Wild West was not the sole preserve of white cowboys. Poitier leads a group of formerly enslaved people to a new land; with a stellar role for Harry Belafonte as a charming fake priest. Native Americans also come to the aid of the caravan.

Building a new life on the fertile soil of the prairies of the West seems like a good idea to a number of freed plantation slaves. They call in the help of Buck (Poitier) to act as a guide and lead their caravan to their promised land.

Buck and the Preacher

exclusiveScreeningsInEye

Exciting and committed to social justice: in The Defiant Ones Stanley Kramer tackles prejudice and racial hatred in an action movie about two escaped prisoners shackled together – one black, the other white. Featuring stellar roles by Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis.

Stanley Kramer’s crime drama about two prisoners – one white, the other black – who escape from a chain gang and need to cooperate to survive, has a pretty simple storyline. Men in the grip of toxic racial hatred and suspicion have to overcome their prejudices to find out that they are really the same, irrespective of skin colour.

Sidney Poitier was a pioneer. In 1963, he was the first African American male to win the Oscar for Best Actor for Lilies of the Field. Poitier was lauded for his style, intelligence and classical technique. He was graceful, self-aware and had immense presence on screen.

Sidney Poitier & Denzel Washington

Sidney Poitier was the first Black man to win a Best Actor Oscar as a helpful former GI who meets five nuns who have escaped from behind the Berlin Wall to a farm in Arizona. This heart-warming comedy drama on the magic of the everyday sparkles in its simplicity.

An unemployed construction worker stops at a remote farm in the Arizona desert to get water for his overheated car. The dilapidated farm is run by a group of Catholic nuns from East Germany, led by a strict Mother Superior who believes that this Homer has been sent by God to found a church in the desert.

Lilies of the Field

In this true story, Denzel Washington plays anti-Apartheid activist Steve Biko in this powerful drama about the friendship between Biko and Donald Woods, a South African journalist (Kevin Kline). Biko died in his cell due to police brutality.

Donald Woods was the editor in chief of the liberal Daily Dispatch during in Apartheid-era South Africa. He wrote various critical articles about the – in his eyes – radical opinions of Steve Biko, the Black Consciousness Movement’s most prominent member. When he met Biko for the first time, the journalist had to modify his opinion considerably. Woods became an active anti-Apartheid activist after Biko was imprisoned in 1977 and died from police brutality. When Woods subsequently wrote a biography of Biko he gained the interest of the security services and fled to Lesotho disguised as a priest.
Richard Attenborough reconstructs the unusual friendship between two men with very different backgrounds and philosophies. Cry Freedom’s strong political message is underlined by Washington and Kline’s excellent acting; both excel in acute, tender and ironic dialogues. Washington received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor for his role. Five years down the line, he would play another black civil rights activist: Malcolm X in Spike Lee's eponymous film.

Cry Freedom

show for: 718173 2022-08-18 21:15:00

Introduced by Leo van Hee (programmer Eye)

The Defiant Ones

Stanley Kramer / US, 1958 / 97 min.

Exciting and committed to social justice: in The Defiant Ones Stanley Kramer tackles prejudice and racial hatred in an action movie about two escaped prisoners shackled together – one black, the other white. Featuring stellar roles by Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis.

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Special screenings

Cry Freedom

Lilies of the Field

Buck and the Preacher

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Sidney Poitier & Denzel Washington