Appelez-moi Monsieur Tibbs !

Has to be a mistake to take the title of a sequel from the best remembered line of the originating movie - it's almost an admission that the new film can't come up with a comparable phrase. The portent is true, I fear, as Sydney Poitier reprises his Virgil Tibbs role in another would-be tough, adult, socially aware murder-thriller, but already the law of diminishing returns is applying and so "Mr Tibbs" is inferior to its predecessor in almost every way.

In fact it looks and feels like nothing more than a harder-edged TV crime show of the time, no better or worse than say "Ironside", fired as it is by a fine, occasionally quirky Quincy Jones soundtrack and replete with our man's personal problems to flesh out the character. This small-screen feel is exacerbated by the appearance of TV stalwarts Martin Landau, Ed Asner and Anthony Zerbe and it's fair to say the film never rises above the heights of a better than average TV cop-show episode.

It's biggest failing of course is the lack of dramatic tension which existed so memorably between Poitier's proud, methodical coloured detective and Rod Steiger's opinionated, redneck workaday sheriff in "...Heat of The Night". Here the film is centred entirely on Poitier and good actor as he is, his unerring instinct and judgement palls as the film progresses, whilst his relationship with friend, do-good minister but murder suspect Landau, never really takes off either. Indeed the central "whodunnit" just isn't strong enough to drive the action on, whilst Tibbs' various interludes with his family slow down the action still further, especially the ho-hum scenes with his "difficult" son.

The film is dated of course by its politics and attitudes - no crime in that - but it doggedly fails to fly and in the end stays as little in the memory as even the best remembered episode of any Kojak / Columbo episode you care to mention. Waiting in the wings, of course was a different kind of black detective who was a sex-machine to all the chicks, to take the genre further - can you dig it!

San Francisco Police Lieutenant Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) is called in to investigate the murder of a prostitute. A community activist Rev. Logan Sharpe (Martin Landau) is accused of the murder.

This is possibly the most disappointing sequel of all times. Coming after the iconic 'In the Heat of the Night', this is best left to the bargain bin of movie history. The story is little more than a rambling police case. There isn't anything here that all other police drama hasn't done. The production value is best describe as 70s TV level. It has no energy, no tension, and no excitement. Sidney Poitier is the only thing that's of any interest. And he looked as frustrated as I was while watching this grind.

A disappointing follow-up to IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT,one of the most seminal films of the 60's,THEY CALL ME MISTER TIBBS! utilises perhaps the previous film's most famous line of dialogue,but all comparisons should end there.The personality clash between Rod Steiger and Sidney Poitier that produced so many vivid and memorable dramatic scenes previously(albeit laced with some humour) is totally missing in this much inferior sequel.Poitier has rightly been praised for bringing dignity and respect to the black man on the American Screen after decades of humiliating and degrading stereotypes,but he looks oddly dispirited here with middling direction,an unexciting plot,and a dullish script.The inclusion of some fine character actors(Anthony Zerbe,Juano Hernandez,Ed Asner,Jeff Corey)is one of the film's few minor points of merit,and Poitier and Martin Landau do their best to make their scenes together have some dramatic impact,but they and others can only do so much with a somewhat banal script.The film may have been better had some pointless and unnecessary domestic scenes involving Tibbs' family(particularly his son) been removed,and which are basically irrelevant to the plot and seem to have been tagged on merely to add extra footage.

The film's best aspect is the musical score by Quincy Jones.Jones' funky interjections are most welcome,and indeed improve the quality of many sequences;it almost seems a touchstone for future blaxsploitation movie scores that were to soon follow,starting with the following year's SHAFT.The film is not totally unwatchable,but a disappointingly listless follow-up to the classic that preceded it.

Rating:5 out of 10.

This Virgil Tibbs is closer to the California-based detective essayed by John Ball in his books. The mystery is worthwhile, and Poitier's performance is masterful. But the writing is pedestrian, the pacing too slow, and the resolution ultimately unsatisfactory. I can give this no better than a 6 out of 10.

This sequel to "In the Heat of the Night" will suffer in inevitable comparisons to its infinitely better predecessor. Instead of looking like a theatrical movie edited for television, "Mister Tibbs" looks suspiciously like a TV movie edited for theatrical release, with grainy photography, cheesy opening titles, and sets that look like they're made of plywood. The murder sequence has a glaring continuity error: the camera shows two hands choking the girl, then a shot of a hand reaching for a statuette, then a shot of the girl being choked with two hands again, and finally the statuette coming down for the fatal blow. Solving the case should be easy: find the only guy with three hands! But the shoddy production values can't completely obscure this film's considerable merits: namely, Sidney Poitier's performance as the cool detective determined to follow the evidence wherever it may lead, even if it implicates a friend. Martin Landau is also convincing as the do-gooder preacher-activist suspected of brutally murdering his prostitute girlfriend. In addition to being haunted by the case, Tibbs is conflicted about his home life, but the issues of race and Tibbs' barely concealed sense of social outrage are absent here. So is the complex murder mystery that made "In the Heat of the Night" so compelling.