Inherit The Wind | Monkey Trial | The Critique

How man appeared on world? Like what Bible tells us or what Charles Darwin explored and concluded. Creation versus evolution. Based on a real life incident where John Scopes is arrested in Dayton, Tennesse for teaching evolution, Inherit The Wind questioned prevalent McCarthyism and practices. Inherit The Wind is not very hard hitting. It subtly puts forward a rational point. It doesn’t rely on lengthy speeches. It, rather, tries to provoke grey cells of viewer. It asks that isn’t like all fundamental rights, right to think is equally important?

 

School teacher Cates is caught for teaching Evolution. Teaching Evolution is prohibited. Mediaperson Hornback decides to back Cates for both personal and professional reason. Col. Brady is brought to prosecute Cates. Brady is a highly respected, failed presidential candidate and Biblical scholar. He is doesn’t believe in Evolution and wants to make a point. However, to support cause of Cates, one of his old friends turned rival Henry Drummond decide to defend Cates and Evolution. Since law questions Cates stand, witnesses advocating Evolution are not admissible. Drummond questions the partition between the ideologies and question the literal interpretation of the Book.

 

Spencer Tracy and Fredric March deliver fine performances as competing lawyers. Their mutual admiration for each other as actor and person is visible. Director Stanley Kramer picked another meaningful subject and made a relevant movie. Spencer Tracy and Stanley Kramer teamed up for many projects – remarkable pieces of cinema, Inherit The Wind was first of them. Inherit The Wind works on two levels – at one level it makes a point that with time one need to see beyond existing knowledge and accept the changes in theory, at another level it supports the argument that one has the right to have an opinion and share it with others.

 

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh