User reviews

What makes this movie special is that it is a true story written by Mary Bradley about people known to her personally, Reba Lee and her mother. The ending was what really happened in real life and the book and movie were pretty much true to life, not "based on a true story" like so many other movies that end up paying only lip service to the true story. Reba Lee's mother was Mary Bradley's seamstress, so she got the story first hand from the people it happened to. To me, that makes the story even more meaningful than if the author had simply interviewed someone she didn't know and told the story from her own viewpoint. I saw the movie many, many years ago and I am not sure I remember details exactly, but it seems to me that the movie was pretty faithful to the book. If you can find either the book or the movie, it is well worth your time to read or watch it.

This film stars Sonya Wilde as a biracial lady and James Franciscus plays her boyfriend who has no idea she isn't 100% lily-white. At first, Sonya doesn't want to pose as white--but she doesn't really fit in with black folks as she appears white. After being refused jobs and being mistreated as biracial, she meets Franciscus and lands a job--and she's tired of not fitting in and just lets people think she's white. After all, in America in 1960, you'd certainly be treated like a second-class citizen if you weren't pure white--which is a stupid shame.

Once the pair marry, things are occasionally a little tough. After all, she's told so many lies about her family and Franciscus and his parents want to meet them. Her lies are a bit hard to swallow and it's not surprising that his mother starts to worry. After all, when the pair are going to LA on their honeymoon (where she told them her parents were), she tells him they can't see her family....as they've just hopped a boat for South America and don't plan on returning!! An additional problem develops when she slowly starts to see that her husband and his family are racists. Can this charade go on any longer--especially when she becomes pregnant? This is generally a very good and engaging film. Here and there are a few moments that seemed like they could have been handled better, but for a relatively low-budget film this can be forgiven. Well worth seeing and an interesting curio. However, I must add that the ending sure felt a bit anti-climactic.

It's an interesting coincidence that this film (which had been on my Netflix queue for some time) came when it did. Just a few days ago, I finished the brilliant novel "Diary of an Ex-Colored Man"--which deals with the same themes as well as discusses why a light-skinned person would want to pose as white. It's a sad story--and a perfect compliment to this film.

I am quite surprised that the lovely Wilde didn't appear in any other films--and only a few guest appearances on TV shows up until 1962. What ever happened to her? I could find nothing on IMDb or when I did a Google search. Odd...

By the way, the DVD print is very, very scratched in places. This doesn't seriously impede the film but it is surprising on a DVD. It could really use some restoration work. However, there are no captions and it would have been nice to have them.

Viewed 60 years later, this 1960 movie raises so many questions that it's hard to know what to make of it. It's not even clear if this is supposed to be a satire or a serious exploration of important issues. But it shows how much has changed since then.

A young, light-skinned African-American woman, tired of discrimination, decides to move away from home and pass for white, as the title says. With lightning speed she gets married to a wealthy white man, but, predictably, gets tied up in knots trying to hide her past. Her new in-laws get suspicious about the fact that they never get to meet her family, or even talk to them on the phone--not even after she gets pregnant. Things get worse when everybody notices that she's too good a dancer for a white woman, or, um, maybe "good" isn't really the word for what she does on the dance floor. And why, O why does she always seem to be on such good terms with all those traveling "" jazz musicians, who aren't allowed to fraternize with the white customers in the jazz clubs she keeps dragging her husband to?

But, of course, the biggest tension in the film is her increasing anxiety about what color the baby's going to be. We all know what it would do to an upper-class white family if their white daughter-in-law, who inexplicably knows too many jazz musicians, had a black baby . . . .

But the greatest mystery of all is: How do you get to a happy ending out of all this? And did she? Hmmm . . . .

"Bernice" (Sonya Wilde) falls in love with, and marries, the well-to-do "Rick" (James Franciscus) and she soon becomes pregnant. Thing is, though, she has one hell of a secret. His entirely white family do not know that she is, well, not... His mother (Elizabeth Council) begins to suspect something is afoot when "Bernice" can't provide her family at the impending birth and, indeed, the only evidence of her mother's existence comes from a photograph that is less than convincing. As is always the case, the web of lies becomes more and more complicated and harder for her to plausibly sustain - especially when the baby arrives and her curious reactions seriously test her relationship with her husband. My problem with this is the underpinning story is really rather weak and the issues it presents us with are all enveloped in scenarios that are a bit contrived. Neither leading actor here really brings much to the party - in fact, it's really only Council who, briefly, engages. The contentious subject matter was clearly all that was on anyone's mind here - the production and delivery of that potentially potent analysis of racism and bigotry is, however, completely lacklustre and this really smacks of a mid-budget television movie.

I PASSED FOR WHITE, one of those title-says-it-all kinda movies, is much better than you'd think. Thanks to the gorgeous Sonya Wilde, who has wonderful acting skills... what a shame she only appeared in a handful of television guest spots thereafter, mostly playing Native Americans on Westerns.

Wilde plays Bernice Lee - her hip brother blows sax at a club and her grandmother has words of wisdom, but no real answers, for what's really troubling Bernice. She can't keep a job when the employers find out she's part black... It was the early sixties, after all.

She decides to become Lila and, on a plane to another state and another life, she meets handsome businessman James Franciscus as Rick Leyton. After a windswept romance they get married. Of course he doesn't realize her secret and the rest of the film has the John "Johnny" Williams's score blasting whenever anyone almost discovers her ruse: especially Rick's pesky mother, continuously asking to meet Bernice's parents.

Wilde handles the melodrama perfectly and reaches for lies about her phantom family better than a lifelong politician. The tension builds nicely between the newlyweds, who make real sparks when times are good. Although Wilde looks so white, the audience won't always share in the controversy of a mixed couple relationship. If it weren't for that pounding soundtrack you might forget what she's so worried about in the first place.

Just imagine that Sarah-Jane , Fannie Hurst's heroine , was able to marry Troy Donahue in Douglas Sirk's remake of "imitation of life"(1959) ;a light -skinned pretty girl like her,her desire was to escape from her condition ; and after marrying James Franciscus (replacing Donahue) ,then the problems begin : the screenplay is thoroughly implausible :how would snub bourgeois parents accept this union while swallowing the heroine 's never-to-be-seen background ?One should note that the denouement is downright reactionary (a person of mixed-race must know her place), but although immensely superior,Sirk's exponential tear-jerker was too (back where both girls belong).

The most interesting character is the husband :first acquaintance shows a very nice man , considerate ,with a beaming smile .But further acquaintance shows that he is the splitting image of his smug parents: he is a racist macho (scene of the meeting with the brother ) and he won't be the dashing attentive escort the viewer expects him to be :no rebellion against a rotten society .....

Fortunately ,things have changed ; more than in the rather bland "guess who's coming to dine" , the great Sidney Poitier,by marrying lovely actress Johanna Shimkus, showed the whole world that interracial unions were a most natural thing .

If "I Passed For White" was released today it would stur up quite a storm! Imagine not knowing what race to identify yourself with? The character of "ETHEL" gives a touching performance as a GAL that just does not know which way to turn! A B movie that few have seen this classic is alot of fun!

I Passed For White seems to be a hidden gem like its leading lady Sonya Wilde. Her voice & sweet personality mixed with innocent xensuality reminded me of a young Marilyn Monroe. I began watching this sometime back, months ago on YouTube, & finally got back to it, after it came to mind yesterday. There's been a lot of focus on African-Americans pasing for Caucasion but some in various areas of the US have also passed themselves off as Native Americans, without a drop of Native American blood, when their ancestors were found listed as a person of color. That's the case with some so-called tribes of the South.

No matter what they passed as to avoid racism, it's a ugly blemish on a huge part of American society, that can't live & let live, & feel it's their right to punish people who not only don't look white, but even those known to have non-white ancestry.

This movie showcases that ignorance perfectly. My only complaint is the ending which made it feel unfinished. I for one wanted more.

Fred M. Wilcox's claim to fame is having directed several classic MGM movies: "Lassie Come Home", "The Secret Garden" and "Forbidden Planet", but this final movie, made for Allied Artists. Is a quite well-made drama with that exploitation movie title "I Passed for White". Writing, producing and directing, he does a fine job with the material.

His script weaves together two major themes: the endemic racial prejudice that continues to exist in America (see: the way jerks like Trump and Vance ridicule Kamala Harris due to her mixed-race status) and more significantly what happens when one lies about oneself instead of finding strength in one's true identity.

Sonya Wilde impresses in the difficult title role, as Wilcox carefully details her problems growing up in a world that's anxious to pigeonhole her. She looks 100% Caucasian but is a member of a Black family, with both her kindly grandma and jazz saxophonist brother identifying as Negro. Tired of being picked on, she heads for Chicago to try a new life on her own, and is fortunate (?) enough to be seated on the plane next to dreamboat James Franciscus.

Growing up I was a big fan of Franciscus, enjoying him as star of "Naked City" and especially "Mr. Novak", and later thrilled (literally) when he starred in Dario Argento's "Cat O' Nine Tails". He was virtually an identical movie type to his contemporary Robert Redford, whose stardom came later and clearly has overshadowed Jim's 100%.

Sonya's inability to stay true to herself in Chicago is quite believable, and once she tries to pretend she's not a Negro in order to make a living and have friends, the lies expand and multiply, and poor Sonya is doomed to suffer.

Franciscus is quite convincing as the too good to be true ideal husband with the kicker that both he and Sonya are genuinely in love. But... society and its pressures intervene.

One interesting fact is that the original score is by "Johnny Williams", one of his first movie assignments, including plenty of excellent jazz music by the future wunderkind of film music. This is a classy, A-movie all the way, with only Wilcox's version of the usual (fake) Hollywood happy ending giving the wrong message in an otherwise sincere drama.