Sidney Poitier (1927-2022) broke a number of obstacles with a filmography that showcased his dazzling vitality and made him cinema’s first Black celebrity.
Be a part of the BFI for this particular occasion celebrating and exploring the unbelievable life and profession of Sidney Poitier, being held on the third anniversary of his passing on the age of 94.
“Sidney Poitier was many issues. An actor, director and activist. Hollywood’s first Black celebrity. A trailblazer and an inspiration. And, in fact, he was Mr Tibbs. This season, whose title is taken from a 1968 James Baldwin profile, commemorates Poitier’s legacy–movies that mirror the development of his profession throughout 40 years. Born in Miami and raised within the Bahamas, from the outset Poitier projected a brand new and dignified African American character – one which dismantled longstanding racist stereotypes. Acutely aware of his duty as the one main Black actor in Hollywood, Poitier initially cultivated a persona of advantage and respectability. Because the winds shifted and audiences started demanding an edgier Black hero, Poitier used his clout to make movies that mirrored the brand new temper. He imbued all his characters with an emotional reality and cemented his place as Hollywood’s firstBlack star.” Jonathan Ali, season programmer
Occasions:
For Love of Sidney Poitier – Monday sixth January @ 18:20pm
This panel dialogue, hosted by season programmer Jonathan Ali of the Twelve30 Collective, will take into account Poitier’s key roles and movies, positioning his filmography throughout the wider panorama of Hollywood and American tradition. It should additionally mirror on his standing as Hollywood’s first Black celebrity and his function in inspiring future generations. (Instantly adopted by a exhibiting of For Love of Ivy)
Hyperlink: BFI
Sidney Poitier: One Brilliant Mild – Thursday ninth January @ 18:15
An Omnibus portrait of the actor and activist, accompanied by a wealth of archival clips. One Brilliant Mild is an enchanting version of the well-known BBC Arts sequence, with Sidney Poitier speaking candidly about his life and profession. This can display screen with numerous different interviews with Poitier, profession overviews, analyses and appreciations of his work. The programme even contains excerpts from the BBC quiz present Mastermind, that includes rounds on Poitier.
Hyperlink: Right here
The Early Movies
No Means Out – Screening Wednesday 1st @18:40 & Saturday eleventh January @ 20:35
In his landmark debut, Poitier performs a medical intern accused by a racist hoodlum of murdering his brother whereas each have been within the Black physician’s care. Poitier shines in a groundbreaking function that challenged Hollywood stereotyping of Black characters whereas establishing the compassionate and dignified persona that might come to dominate his roles over the following twenty years.
Hyperlink: Right here
Blackboard Jungle – Screening Thursday 2nd @ 20:55pm & Monday thirteenth January @ 18:20pm
Sidney Poitier cuts a cool determine as a teen insurgent on this traditional about high-school delinquency.
Poitier performs the function of Gregory Miller, the chief of an interracial gang at an inner-city college the place a brand new instructor struggles to take care of management. Though a supporting character, Poitier as Miller is unforgettable – a sullen, confident, sexually charged Black counterpart to the Hollywood youth antihero of the Nineteen Fifties.
Hyperlink: Right here
Fringe of the Metropolis (aka A Man is Ten Ft Tall) – Screening Friday third January @ 17:40pm
This gritty movie sees Poitier play Tommy Tyler, a New York Metropolis dockworker who takes a brand new rent below his wing. However a racist colleague quickly threatens their friendship. Tommy is the embodiment of the self-sacrificing hero, a task that outlined this stage of Poitier’s profession.
Hyperlink: Right here
Additionally screening with an intro by season programmer Jonathan Ali on Thursday twenty third January @ 20:40pm
Hyperlink: Right here
One thing of Worth – Screening Friday third January @ 20:40pm
In a drama set and shot in Kenya, Poitier performs Kimani, the childhood good friend of Peter, the son of British settlers. Political circumstances drive them aside with Kimani becoming a member of the Mau Mau rise up – which finally results in a climactic showdown between the previous mates. Poitier delivers a compellingly complicated efficiency, within the first of a number of movies he made in Africa the place his character fights for liberation from white-minority rule.
Hyperlink: Right here
Additionally screening with a pre-recorded intro by researcher Liz Chegeon Sunday nineteenth January @ 12:40pm
Hyperlink: Right here
Stardom
The Defiant Ones – Screening Sunday fifth @ 12:20 & Sunday nineteenth January @ 15:40pm
Poitier’s first collaboration with director Stanley Kramer is an action-packed thriller that reworked the actor into the primary bona fide Black film star. He performs Noah Cullen, an escaped convict within the Deep South who’s handcuffed to a racist white man. To remain alive and out of attain of the authorities, the pair forge an embittered friendship. As a person seething with rage from a lifetime of indignity, Poitier is great. This movie function earned him a landmark first Oscar nomination for Finest Actor.
Hyperlink: Right here
A Raisin within the Solar – Screening Saturday 4th @ 15:45pm, 20:30pm & Friday twenty fourth January @ 20:30pm
A task Sidney Poitier performed on the stage, and gained large reward for, was then supplied to him for the display screen adaptation: the story of a chauffeur who desires of higher issues for himself and his household than life in a cramped condo on Chicago’s South Aspect. Accompanied by a formidable ensemble of African American performing expertise, Poitier skilfully conveys a struggle for dignity and a struggle to be the anchor his family members so desperately want.
Hyperlink: Right here
Paris Blues – Screening Saturday 4th January @ 20:45 & Friday twenty fourth January @ 18:10
Sidney Poitier charms and woos because the dashing American jazz musician Eddie Cook dinner, who’s having fun with the liberty of bohemian Paris together with his bandmate, Ram Bowen (performed by Paul Newman). The good-looking pair fall for 2 American girls visiting the town, and Eddie is torn as his new beau tries to persuade him to return to America along with her. This movie incorporates a rating composed by the one and solely Duke Ellington, in addition to an on-screen cameo by Louis Armstrong.
Hyperlink: Right here
The Slender Thread – Screening Saturday 4the January @ 18:30pm
Following his historic Finest Actor Oscar win in 1963 for Lilies of the Discipline, Poitier joined actress Anne Bancroft this psychological drama. He’s riveting as psychiatry scholar Alan Newell, who should use each tactic he has to maintain a depressed lady, who has swallowed a bottle of sleeping drugs, on a disaster – centre hotline lengthy sufficient for the authorities to rescue her.
Hyperlink: Right here
Additionally screening with an intro by season programmer Jonathan Ali on Monday twenty seventh January @ 20:35pm
Hyperlink: Right here
Within the Warmth of the Evening – Screening Sunday fifth January @18:30pm & Wednesday fifteenth January @ 20:45pm
Sidney Poitier delivers his most celebrated efficiency as a detective investigating a homicide. Now one of many nice strains in movie historical past, ‘They name me Mr Tibbs!’ introduced the arrival of Poitier’s detective to Rod Steiger’s racist Mississippi sheriff. They discover themselves working collectively on a sinister homicide case. Winner of the Finest Image Oscar and spawning two sequels, this police procedural cemented Poitier’s legacy as a Black cinema icon and stays as electrifying at this time because it was when it was first launched. It was the primary main movie in color that was lit particularly for a Black actor, and it options the enduring slap scene – a superb on-screen present of defiance and resistance from a Black man in opposition to a white man.
Hyperlink: Right here
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner – Screening Sunday fifth January @ 14:50pm, Wednesday eighth January @ 20:40pm & Friday Thirty first January @ 18:00pm
Sidney Poitier was on the peak of his fame, and exuding peak ranges of appeal, on this hit 60s comedy about an interracial marriage. In it, Poitier’s character John Prentice seeks to persuade his white associate’s dad and mom that he’s a worthy son-in-law. The movie was an enormous success within the US and has gone down in movie historical past as one of many greats.
Hyperlink: Right here
Blaxploitation and Past
For Love of Ivy – Screening Monday sixth January @ 20:30pm & Saturday twenty fifth January @ 12:30pm
Sidney Poitier and jazz singer Abbey Lincoln gentle up the display screen on this charming romantic comedy.
Poitier performs Jack Parks, a profitable businessman with a secret playing operation who’s blackmailed into seducing the maid of a white suburban household. Along with his virile, roguish, tuxedo-clad character, Poitier intentionally refashioned his cinematic persona for a movie primarily based on his personal unique story thought.
Hyperlink: Right here
The Misplaced Man – Screening Saturday eleventh January @ 18:00pm & Monday twentieth January @ 20:35pm
Sidney Poitier is a brooding Black Energy revolutionary on this tense thriller. Wounded throughout an armed theft that was supposed to finance the Black battle, Poitier’s character seeks assist from a white, middle-class liberal lady, even because the police shut in. Poitier is at his most militant in a movie that displays America’s altering racial and political local weather.
Hyperlink: Right here
A Heat December– Screening Sunday twelfth January @ 12:30pm & Thursday thirtieth January @ 18:10pm
Sidney Poitier performs a physician who visits London after the loss of life of his spouse and falls in love with a mysterious lady who has her personal tragic previous. That is Sidney Poitier’s first movie that he directed on his personal in addition to starred in.
Hyperlink: Right here
The Wilby Conspiracy – Screening Tuesday twenty eighth January @ 20:40pm
Sidney Poiter groups up with one other movie legend, Michael Caine, on this political thriller set in South Africa. Poitier continued his shift away from his suave, clean-cut display screen persona with this function, the place he performs a militant freedom fighter who escapes the police and goes on the run with an Englishman (Caine).
Hyperlink: Right here
Additionally screening with an introduction on Friday seventeenth January @ 18:10pm
Hyperlink: Right here
Stir Loopy – Screening Friday seventeenth January @ 20:40pm
Stir Loopy is the primary movie that Poitier directed however didn’t act in. It’s a buddy comedystarring Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder, that follows two finest mates hatching an elaborate escape plan from jail. It was the primary movie by a Black director to gross over $100 million on the field workplace.
Hyperlink: Right here
Additionally screening with an introduction by researcher/curator Matthew Barrington on Wednesday twenty ninth January @ 20:40pm
Hyperlink: Right here
Sneakers – Screening Sat 18 Jan 20:35 & Mon 27 Jan 18:00
One among Sidney Poitier’s final massive display screen roles was 1992’s Sneakers, an entertaining heist thriller movie. In it, Poitier performs a retired CIA agent and member of an knowledgeable safety staff, who endure a mysterious mission, solely to search out themselves trapped in an internet of intrigue.
Hyperlink: Right here
Lastly, screening as a part of our common programme:
Seniors’ Free Matinee: Cry, the Beloved Nation + intro and Q&A with Marcus Powell, speaker, movie historian.
One among Sidney Poitier’s best roles sees him play a younger priest, who accompanies an ageing preacher looking for his grownup youngsters in Apartheid South Africa.
Shot on location in each South Africa and within the UK, this movie co-stars Canada Lee, a veteran actor and civil rights activist.
This screening is free for anybody over 60–simply ebook by telephone on020 7960 2102 (strains open from 12-7pm Mon-Sat, and 12-6pm Solar) or ebook in individual at BFI Southbank.
Hyperlink: Right here
The season screens @ BFI Southbank from 1st-Thirty first January