Plot

In 1940s Chicago, a young black man takes a job as a chauffeur to a white family, which takes a turn for the worse when he accidentally kills the teenage daughter of the couple and then tries to cover it up.

Bigger Thomas, an African American who lives in an impoverished neighborhood, is employed by a prosperous white family who live in the suburbs of a major city. The money Bigger makes at his new job will be used to supplement his mother's income. As a chauffeur, he is directed by the father of the family to take Mary, the daughter, to the university. Instead, Mary decides to pick up her Socialist boyfriend, Jan, and to spend the time drinking and partying. Jan and Mary portray a young liberal couple who venture into a black neighborhood with Bigger for the sole purpose of being entertained at Ernie's, a black nightclub. On the way home, Mary becomes inebriated and Bigger must get her to her bedroom without being detected. Mary's mother, who is blind, enters the room and Bigger panics at the thought of being caught with a white woman. He accidentally kills Mary by placing a pillow over her head to keep her quiet. Still frightened, Bigger disposes of the body in the furnace, possibly because he feels he would not get a fair trial for the accidental death of a white woman. Meanwhile, Jan is wanted by the police for Mary's murder and Bigger plays a role in the accusations against him.—Broncine G. Carter

In 1940s Chicago, a young black man takes a job as a chauffeur to a wealthy white family, which takes a turn for the worse when he accidentally kills the wild and crazy teenage daughter of the couple and then tries to cover it up because he knows that he will not receive justice.—MonkeyKingMA

In December 1939, 19-year-old African American Bigger Thomas (Victor Love) wakes up and rouses his younger brother Buddy, sister Vera, and mother, Mrs. "Mama" Thomas (Oprah Winfrey), in their tenement bedroom on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois. When Mama screams at a rat, Bigger pounds it with a skillet and drops the dead rodent off the back porch.

Mama reminds Bigger that county welfare officials have set up a job appointment for him that afternoon with Mr. Henry Dalton (John McMartin), a wealthy white man. After leaving his home, Bigger meets his friend, Gus (Willard E. Pugh), and as they walk, Bigger's girl friend, Bessie Mears (Akosua Busia), asks why he did not visit her the other day. A passing car splashes Bigger with dirty water, and he laments that something awful is going to happen.

At a pool hall, Bigger, Gus, Jack, and G.H. discuss robbing a white storekeeper and agree to meet at three in the afternoon. Bigger sneaks into his apartment to get a pistol, then joins his friends at a movie theater to watch a high-society comedy called 'My Man Godfrey'. They wonder if white folks really live like that. Returning to the pool hall, Bigger fights Gus for being late and blames him for having to postpone the robbery.

Bigger takes Chicago's elevated train to Henry Dalton's mansion. Peggy (Geraldine Page), the Daltons' Irish housekeeper, ushers him into the living room, where Henry Dalton and his blind wife, Elaine (Caroll Baker), greet him. Asked how far he went in school, Bigger admits he has only an eighth-grade education. Elaine hopes he can return to school while he works there. Peggy feeds Bigger and tells him the Daltons are generous, liberal employers. Their daughter, Mary (Elizabeth McGovern), has just returned from Europe, Peggy informs him, and worries her parents because she hangs around with Communists. Peggy shows Bigger how the furnace works and how he needs to regularly remove ashes. Bigger puts his gun under the mattress of the bed in his new room.

Later, dressed in a chauffeur's uniform, Bigger drives Mary to her school, but Mary instructs him to take her downtown instead and asks him not to tell her parents, because she is on the "same side" as Bigger. Mary introduces Bigger to her boyfriend, Jan Erlone (Matt Dillon), a local left-wing activist who demands to drive the car and show Bigger they are social equals. The two privileged white teenagers talk about a coming revolution, and act as if Bigger is in collusion with them. They browbeat him into taking them to Ernie's Kitchen Shack in the black section of town, where the black staff and clientele are dismayed by the presence of white people, and Bigger is embarrassed. When Bessie Mears enters, Bigger ignores her. As he reluctantly answers questions about his life, Mary and Jan are shocked that nobody was punished for his father's lynching in the Deep South 12 years earlier.

On the way home, Jan and Mary drunkenly sing "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot." When Bigger drops Jan at a train station, the young man gives him Communist pamphlets. By the time Bigger returns to the Dalton mansion, Mary has to be carried to her room. As Bigger lays her on her bed, she clings to him. Suddenly Elaine Dalton enters the room, calling to Mary. Bigger places a pillow over Mary's face to quiet her until her blind mother leaves, but when he removes the pillow, Mary is dead. Aware that he will not receive justice for this, Bigger carries her body to the basement and burns it in the furnace, then walks to the train station and goes home to tell his happy mother he got the job.

Returning to the Dalton home in the early morning, Bigger finds Peggy in the basement, ready to put coal in the furnace, so he volunteers to do it instead. Peggy tells Bigger he has to take Mary to the train station for her trip to Detroit, Michigan. Bigger hurries to his room, vomits, and hides Jan's Communist pamphlets in a drawer. Though Peggy cannot find Mary in her room, she tells Bigger to drive her trunk to the station, and then he can take the day off. Bigger returns to his neighborhood and visits Bessie's apartment. She is angry that he ignored her at Ernie's, and hints at her fears about his angry outbursts.

Later, at the Dalton house, Peggy instructs Bigger to retrieve the trunk he left at the station because Mary never arrived in Detroit. In the basement, Mr. Dalton introduces Bigger to Mr. Britton, a private investigator. Britton asks Bigger when he took Mary to school, then smashes a piece of wood against his chair when he fails to speak up. Bigger confesses that Mary ordered him to drive to the Labor Defenders office on Lake Street to pick up her boyfriend Jan. After driving around, they got drunk at a place on the South Side and Bigger took them home around 2:00 a.m.

Later, the detective brings Jan Erlone to Bigger's room. Jan admits being with Mary, but says they were not drunk, and he did not bring her home. Henry Dalton offers to pay Jan for information about Mary's whereabouts, but the young man walks out. After the others leave, Bigger gets his pistol and walks to the station, but Jan stops him on the way and asks what Dalton and Britton said to make Bigger turn against him. Bigger draws his gun and tells Jan to leave him alone.

Bigger runs to Bessie's apartment and prints a ransom note to let the Daltons know Mary is safe. Bigger slides the note under the Daltons' front door. Peggy finds the note and gives it to Mr. Dalton, who gathers several reporters in the basement for a press conference. Peggy informs Bigger he needs to clean the furnace because the house is getting cold, but when he opens the furnace, it is choked from ashes and smoke pours out. The reporters find bones and an earring inside, and Bigger flees the house.

On the street, he hears radio reports that police are combing the South Side for a Negro "rapist" and murderer. Fleeing to a rooftop, Bigger is trapped by vigilantes, knocked off a water tower by a fireman's hose, and thrown in jail. After several days, Jan Erlone visits Bigger's cell and asks why he killed Mary. Bigger refuses to speak. Jan admits having no idea how socially "far apart" they were when he and Mary forced themselves on him. Jan introduces Bigger to Max (John Karlen), an attorney friend from the pro-Marxist Labor Defenders who wants to represent him in court. Then, the racist assistant district attorney Buckley (David Rasche) enters the cell to tell Bigger he has enough evidence to put him in "a dozen electric chairs."

At the court inquest, the Daltons ask Bigger to confess who helped him kill Mary. Mama Thomas arrives where she gives Bigger a crucifix and begs him to "go to God." She humiliates Bigger by kneeling and pleading with the Daltons to stop the law from killing her boy. Buckley tries to soften Bigger by telling him he knows how it feels to be a "colored man" cut off from society, but when the assistant district attorney mentions rape, Bigger yells that he did not rape Mary. Bigger insists that Jan had nothing to do with killing Mary or writing the ransom note. At night, a lynch mob of white men outside Bigger's jail burn a cross and scream racial slurs.

The next morning, Max enters Bigger's cell and asks about the murder, Bigger explains that Mary's death was an accident and he did not rape her. However, he admits to hating the rich young woman because she presumed to be his friend. Max tries to explain that Mary was naive and innocent. Max explains that all Bigger had to do was let Mrs. Dalton know at the time that he was bringing Mary to her room, but Bigger claims he was "dead" the moment he stepped into that room.

During the trial, the district attorney tries to implicate Jan by saying his Communist pamphlets inspired Bigger to rape and kill Mary. In her testimony, the racist Peggy blames Mama Thomas for improperly raising her son. Taking the witness stand, Bigger, in his testimony, tells Max in open court that he blames society for the way it treats Negroes. During a break in the trial, Jan privately apologizes to Bigger for patronizing him and not appreciating who he really was. Predictably, Bigger is found guilty of first degree murder by the racist all-white jury and immediately is sentenced to death.

A few days later, Max pays Bigger a visit to his cell on Death Row where he thanks Max for treating him like a man and a human being. Bigger claims he now sees himself and others as they are, and knows the racist white people who convicted him hated him as much as he hated them. Bigger feels all right now, because he understands and no longer afraid of death. He asks Max to let Mama know he did not cry, and to tell Jan "hello". Max leaves the condemned man's cell.