Sidney Poitier was one of Hollywood's great trailblazers, probably the first African American to achieve mainstream success. 'No Way Out (1950)' was his debut leading performance, and (despite being billed fourth) he carries the role with incredible charisma, as Luther Brooks, a young doctor who is constantly vilified by white patients harbouring racial prejudices. After a criminal (Harry Bellaver) dies in Dr Brooks' care, his low-life brother Ray Biddle (played by Richard Widmark, who can hurl racial epithets with the best of them) accuses the doctor of murder, and the incident sparks civil unrest across the city.
There's a haunting sense of futility about the film. Brooks tries everything possible to prove, both to himself and to Ray Biddle, that his diagnosis and conduct towards his white patient were medically justified. However, even when faced with the direct evidence of an autopsy, his accuser stubbornly maintains Brooks' culpability. The villain here experiences no moral revelation, retaining his racial prejudices even as, in the final moments, Brooks saves the man's life by treating his injuries. An original version of the script reportedly ended with Brooks' murder, a conclusion that would no doubt have left viewers totally and irretrievably gutted. In the finished product, at least there's hope for most.
Everyone in this film, it seems, was kicking serious goals in 1950. Widmark also appeared in Kazan's epidemic thriller 'Panic in the Streets (1950)' and Dassin's British noir 'Night and the City (1950),' one of my favourite films. Director Joseph Mankiewicz also directed the Oscar- winning 'All About Eve (1950),' which I like to characterise as a "two- hour cat-fight," and a most entertaining one at that. Throughout his distinguished career, Poitier would go on to appear in various other landmark pictures exploring themes of racial prejudice and tolerance, including 'The Defiant Ones (1958),' 'Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)' and 'In the Heat of the Night (1967)' {the latter of which bears many similarities with this film, replacing Poitier's doctor with a detective}.
There's a haunting sense of futility about the film. Brooks tries everything possible to prove, both to himself and to Ray Biddle, that his diagnosis and conduct towards his white patient were medically justified. However, even when faced with the direct evidence of an autopsy, his accuser stubbornly maintains Brooks' culpability. The villain here experiences no moral revelation, retaining his racial prejudices even as, in the final moments, Brooks saves the man's life by treating his injuries. An original version of the script reportedly ended with Brooks' murder, a conclusion that would no doubt have left viewers totally and irretrievably gutted. In the finished product, at least there's hope for most.
Everyone in this film, it seems, was kicking serious goals in 1950. Widmark also appeared in Kazan's epidemic thriller 'Panic in the Streets (1950)' and Dassin's British noir 'Night and the City (1950),' one of my favourite films. Director Joseph Mankiewicz also directed the Oscar- winning 'All About Eve (1950),' which I like to characterise as a "two- hour cat-fight," and a most entertaining one at that. Throughout his distinguished career, Poitier would go on to appear in various other landmark pictures exploring themes of racial prejudice and tolerance, including 'The Defiant Ones (1958),' 'Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)' and 'In the Heat of the Night (1967)' {the latter of which bears many similarities with this film, replacing Poitier's doctor with a detective}.