What's for dessert? Dark Chocolate or White Chocolate?

What's cooking? Are we having Cookies and Cream? Oreo's? Just kidding. Better yet, who's coming to dinner? Well, the title says it all as it all rings a bell to the movie that we had just watched called "Guess who's coming to Dinner". The 1967 film, which stars Katharine Hepburn and Sidney Poitier and directed by Stanley Kramer portrays an interracial couple and the potential tribes and tribulations they must face as a couple in the coming years as this was the time of the Civil Rights. 

This is a very interesting topic as it depicts how people reacted when there were interracial couples and  although its not as shocking as it was in the earlier days, it still remains somewhat of a controversial subject. The movie itself portrays two lovers, a young caucasian female by the name of Joanna Drayton (Hepburn) who is madly in love with a successful black, middle aged male named Dr. John Wade Prentice (played by Poitier). The shocking part is not the fact that it is an interracial couple, but the fact is the way people react to interracial couples and how they feel. Before even meeting Dr. John Wade Prentice, they way Joanna described him seemed to be the man of any woman's dreams. He is a successful doctor, who is smart, caring, sensitive, and well-mannered. That is the description of a perfect gentlemen that any woman and their mothers could wish for. CUT! Lets fast forward to when her mother hears all the gushy details but then finds out that Dr. Prentice is an African American male. She is absolutely shocked but later on she comes to accept the fact that her daughter is in love. On the other hand, her father was clueless at first as their house maid Tillie was trying to tell him what was going on, what the shocking news was. As Joanna announces to her father, she tells her parents that regardless how they feel, she will still tie the knot with Dr. Prentice. What she doesn't know is that her soon to be husband went behind her back and told her parents that he will not marry Joanne unless they (the parents) don't have any objections. That shows how respectful he is of Joanne and her parents. It may sound like a simple idea for two people to be able to love each other, but at this time coming from two different worlds it was hard for the older generation to understand.

This movie was quite meticulously crafted in a good sense as it seemed to educate those at the time about interracial marriages/couples. One must keep in mind that this was filmed during the time of the Civil Rights Movement, a time where segregation was coming to an end. Although filmed in 1967, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 seemed to pave the way, an idea that it was okay to come together as one. No longer were blacks separated in schools, buses, drinking fountains, businesses, but this was a time for change in America. Of course when there is change, it takes time. 1967 was no different as people were slowly accepting the fact that blacks had equal rights just as the whites did. furthering my research in connection to the movie, I came across the Anti-miscegenation laws which was a law that had prohibited interracial marriages between people of color and the whites. The law was lifted the same year this movie had come out because of the Loving vs. Virginia case which help appeal this Law. (Perfect timing for the movie to come out). This movie gave a person the idea that it was okay for a black man and a white woman to love each other (or vise-versa), it was okay for them to get married. True, this was a hard fact for America to grasp but change is inevitable. However, it is sad to say that the idea of interracial marriage still bothers some people today. Times have certainly changed but it has only be about 40 years since this law has been appealed (at least in most states during that time). Some bigger issues we face today is the idea of gay marriage. Despite the fact that it is not necessarily a race issue, people of the same sex are denied the right to marriage (Illegal in all states except for California and Massachusetts). That seems to be the bigger issue that we face today as opposed to interracial marriage and coupling.