Otto Preminger was a man who loved a good fight. If he wasn't screaming at his actors, he was battling the Hays Code or picking apart the social fabric of America with a camera. When people talk about hurry sundown the movie, they usually start with the cast—Michael Caine and Jane Fonda in a Southern melodrama? It sounds like a fever dream. But the 1967 film is much more than a casting oddity. It’s a massive, sprawling, often clumsy attempt to tackle the racial and economic tension of the post-WWII South that ended up being just as chaotic behind the scenes as it was on the screen.
It bombed. Critics hated it. Yet, looking back from 2026, it stands as a bizarre monument to a transitional era in cinema.
The Southern Gothic Nightmare That Almost Didn't Happen
The plot is thick. It’s based on a massive novel by K.B. Gilden (a pseudonym for a husband-and-wife writing team). We're in Georgia, right after the war. Michael Caine plays Henry Warren, a greedy, manipulative land grabber who wants to sell a massive chunk of land to a northern cannery. The problem? Two small plots of land stand in his way. One is owned by his cousin, Rad McDowell (John Phillip Law), and the other by a Black farmer named Reeve Scott (Robert Hooks).
Henry is a piece of work. He spends most of the movie trying to trick, bully, or legally maneuver these two men out of their dirt. Jane Fonda plays his wife, Julie, caught in the middle of a moral vacuum.
Hollywood was changing in 1967. The civil rights movement was in full swing, and movies like In the Heat of the Night and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner were winning hearts and Oscars. Hurry sundown the movie tried to join that club but did it with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Preminger didn't do "quiet." He did "loud."
The Michael Caine Accent Problem
Let’s be real. Hearing Michael Caine try to do a Georgia accent is an experience. It’s... interesting. Caine himself has been pretty open about how difficult the shoot was. He was a Cockney lad thrust into the deep South, working for a director who was famously verbally abusive.
Preminger didn't just yell; he dismantled people.
Faye Dunaway was also in this. It was her film debut. She and Preminger clashed so hard that she eventually sued him to get out of her multi-picture contract. Imagine being a young actress on your first big set and having a legendary director treat you like a subordinate who couldn't act. It was a pressure cooker.
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Why the Production Was Actually Dangerous
This isn't just movie trivia. The filming of hurry sundown the movie took place in Louisiana, and the local reaction was hostile. We are talking about 1966. A racially integrated film crew and cast moving into a small Southern town was asking for trouble.
The production faced genuine threats.
- The Ku Klux Klan reportedly harassed the set.
- The crew had to have armed guards.
- Local hotels refused to house the Black cast members.
- Tires were slashed.
Robert Hooks, who played Reeve, has spoken about the visceral fear the cast felt. They weren't just making a movie about racism; they were living through it in real-time. This tension bled into the performances. You can see it in the eyes of the actors. There’s a rawness there that isn't just "acting." It’s genuine discomfort.
Breaking the Taboos
Preminger was a provocateur. He had already broken the Production Code with The Moon Is Blue (using the word "virgin") and The Man with the Golden Arm (drug addiction). In hurry sundown the movie, he pushed the envelope with a suggestive scene involving Jane Fonda and a saxophone. It seems quaint now, but in 1967, it was scandalous.
He wanted to show the intersection of sex, power, and race. He didn't always succeed. Sometimes the movie feels like a soap opera that accidentally wandered into a political rally. But you can't deny the ambition.
The Critics Sharpen Their Knives
When the film finally hit theaters, the reviews were brutal. Bosley Crowther of The New York Times basically called it a disaster. Critics felt the film was "cliché-ridden" and "vulgar."
They weren't entirely wrong.
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The movie is long. It's nearly two and a half hours. It meanders. It leans into stereotypes even while trying to subvert them. For example, the depiction of the Black community in the film is meant to be heroic, but it occasionally drifts into "noble sufferer" territory that feels dated.
However, the cinematography by Milton Krasner is actually quite stunning. He captures the heat. You can almost feel the humidity coming off the screen. The wide shots of the Georgia (actually Louisiana) landscape are beautiful, contrasting sharply with the ugly human behavior occurring within them.
Comparing it to its Contemporaries
Why did In the Heat of the Night succeed where this failed?
- Pacing. In the Heat of the Night is a tight mystery.
- Chemistry. Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger had a legendary dynamic.
- Directing. Norman Jewison had a lighter touch than Preminger.
Hurry sundown the movie feels like it's trying to be an epic like Gone with the Wind, but for the civil rights era. It just couldn't quite carry the weight. It’s too lurid. Too "Technicolor" in its emotions.
The Legacy of a Flawed Gem
Is it worth watching today? Honestly, yes.
It’s a fascinating time capsule. Seeing Jane Fonda right before she became "Hanoi Jane" and a serious political activist is striking. You can see the seeds of her future self in her performance. Michael Caine, despite the accent, is always magnetic. He plays a villain you love to hate.
But more importantly, it shows what Hollywood thought "progressive" filmmaking looked like in the late 60s. It was messy. It was loud. It was deeply flawed.
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The film also features a great supporting cast, including Diahann Carroll and Burgess Meredith. Meredith, in particular, chews the scenery as a judge. It’s a reminder of the depth of talent available in the studio system even when the script was shaky.
Technical Specs and Availability
- Director: Otto Preminger
- Runtime: 146 minutes
- Studio: Paramount Pictures
- Music: Hugo Montenegro (The score is actually quite good, very evocative of the era).
Finding a high-quality version of hurry sundown the movie was difficult for years, but it has since seen releases on Blu-ray and various streaming platforms. If you watch it, do so with the context of 1967 in mind. Don't expect a modern masterpiece. Expect a loud, sweaty, angry film that tried to change the world and tripped over its own feet.
How to Approach the Film Today
If you're a film student or a history buff, you need to see this. Most people skip it in favor of the "prestige" films of the era. That’s a mistake. You learn more from the ambitious failures than the safe successes.
Watch for the power dynamics. Look at how Preminger uses space in the frame to show the divide between the characters. Notice the way the land itself is treated as a character. These are the things that make the movie endure despite the bad reviews.
Moving Forward with Classic Cinema
To truly understand hurry sundown the movie, you should pair it with other films from that specific 1967-1968 window.
- Compare the treatment of race with The Learning Tree (1969), directed by Gordon Parks.
- Look at the "Southern" atmosphere compared to Reflections in a Golden Eye.
- Research the legal battles Otto Preminger had with the rating boards during this period.
Understanding the "why" behind the movie's failure makes it a much more rewarding watch. It wasn't just a bad movie; it was a movie that the world wasn't quite ready for, and a movie that wasn't quite ready for the world. It’s a collision of old Hollywood style and new world problems.
If you want to dive deeper into 1960s cinema, your next step is to look at the transition from the "Studio System" to "New Hollywood." Hurry sundown the movie sits right on that jagged edge. Read up on Otto Preminger's biography Willi, or check out Michael Caine’s memoirs for his hilariously blunt take on the filming process. Seeing the movie through their eyes changes everything.