Guess Whose Coming to Dinner

Movie Review and Analysis of Communication Styles of the Characters

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner is a 1967 Academy Award-winning comedy-drama film starring Spencer Tracy, Sidney Poitier, Katharine Hepburn, and Katharine Houghton.

The main characters:

Sidney Poitier - Dr. John Wade Prentice

Katharine Houghton - Joanne �Joey’ Drayton, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Drayton

Katharine Hepburn - Christina Drayton, wife of Matt Drayton

Spencer Tracy - Matt Drayton

Other Characters include Monsignor Mike Ryan, family friend of Mr. and Mrs. Drayton, their maid Tillie and Mr. and Mrs. Prentice, parents of Dr. John Wade Prentice.

Plot Summary and Overall Non-Verbal Indicators

The movie concerns Joanna Drayton, a young white American woman (Houghton) who has had a whirlwind romance with Dr. Prentice (Poitier), an African American she met while on a holiday in Hawaii. The two plan to marry and she will return with him to Switzerland. The plot is centered on Joanna’s return to her liberal upper class American home in San Francisco, bringing her new fiancÐ"© to dinner to meet her parents, and the reaction of family and friends.

The movie starts with Dr. Prentice visiting Joey’s home to meet her parents. He is a noble, rich, intelligent, handsome, ethical medical expert who serves on United Nations committees when he's not hurrying off to Africa, Asia, Switzerland and all those other places where his genius is required.

The first scene that brings out the strong non-verbal communication used in the movie is the interaction of Dr. Prentice and Joey with Mrs. Drayton’s secretary, Hillary. One can observe the tense expression on Hillary’s face as well as the disbelief and a little bit of contempt in her eyes on hearing the news of Joanne marrying an African-American man. She rarely blinks her eyes and keeps them firmly fixed on Dr. Prentice throughout the scene not registering more than half of the information given to her by Joanne.

On reaching Joey’s home, Dr. Prentice is introduced to the housemaid Dorothy, an African-American lady. She has a stern look on her face and closely scrutinizes Dr. Prentice in silence as if reading his thoughts. She conveys the idea as though she has already analyzed the visitor and passed a judgment on him, disapproving of his intentions. Even in the couple of scenes to follow, Dorothy maintains the stern look on her face portraying her strong disapproval. One can notice the limp handshake between Dr. Prentice and Dorothy signifying that the doctor could not impress her.

This is followed by a still better example of that of the interaction with Mrs. Drayton. Mrs. Drayton takes the news rather well ("Just let me sit down a moment and I'll be all right"), but the intensity of emotions expressed in her eyes is outstanding. She very easily conveys to the audience her state of mind, the conflicts, feeling of shock, her apprehensions, clearly indicating that what she said was a forced effort. The tense face muscles add impact to the expressions. However, she always tries to be friendly to Dr. Prentice throughout her conversation.

The next scene is when the news of the marriage is broken to Mr. Drayton whose calm and friendly disposition is suddenly overcome by a somber, more nervous one which is elucidated during the handshake with Dr. Prentice. Mr. Drayton is totally taken aback by the situation at hand and this has been effectively brought forth through his jittery body language and nervous clasping of his hands. On the other hand, Dr. Prentice also shows his nervousness by the rubbing of hands at the table and the playing around with his sandwich while Joey is the most comfortable character during the scene which is clearly visible through her calm and informal behavior as if no new development has taken place and all the characters are extremely familiar and comfortable with each other.

Mr. Drayton although he is a liberal newspaper publisher and a crusader against prejudice, he doesn't want to be hurried into making up his mind. And that's the trouble. Dr. Prentice has to catch the 10 p.m. flight to Geneva, so he has to decide before then. The artificial deadline provides automatic suspense and keeps the action within a short span of time.

Another scene which speaks a lot about Dr. Prentice’s state of mind is when he talks to his parents on the phone both at the airport and in the study of Mr. Drayton. He’s clearly uncomfortable while he is telling his parents about the lady in his life. The facial expressions, nervousness and sweat on his forehead all suggest that he is uncomfortable. In fact he’s not comfortable about telling them that she’s not African вЂ"American on the phone and prefers a less confrontational way of doing so by writing to them about it.

After news has been broken to both Mr. and Mrs. Drayton, their first conversation about the recent development is in Mr. Drayton’s study. First thing to observe is that when they are with each other they are much more relaxed and completely comfortable with each other. They are not shy of expressing their feelings to each other and in fact for the first time Mrs. Drayton expresses her approval or atleast a �no-objection’ to the marriage. She is proud of her daughter’s choice and the fact that the values that they have taught her have not gone amiss in their daughter.

It’s during this conversation that Dr. prentice enters the study and tells Joanne’s parents about the importance of their approval for the marriage. This scene shows Dr. Prentice at his best possible with both words and non-verbal communication. He is sure about what he’s talking, emphasizes the right words, pauses at the right moments and looks sincere in his attempt when he tells them that unless they approve, the marriage is not possible. At the end of this conversation one can see that Mrs. Drayton is impressed by Dr. Prentice and his maturity. That can be seen by her beaming face. Mr. Drayton is somehow still not convinced but he has a much softer expression than earlier. It’s as if he is thinking about it and clearly he cannot make his mind up. But after this conversation