Gone With The Wind Is the Worst Movie Ever (western, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, screen)

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by Lamplight

How do you know they're all ignoring the racism? Maybe they are simply able to appreciate the story considering the context, despite the racism. I think you're looking at a story that's mostly about a southern aristocrat during Reconstruction, and expecting it to be a story about how horrible slavery was.

I don't expect that at all. People can write all the stories about southern aristocrats they want. Those stories can even have slaves in them. Just don't resort to caricature and outright offensive distortion. Take, for example, the movie Sommersby with Richard Gere and Jodie Foster. They remained faithful to history and depicted blacks during the Reconstruction period without relying on ugly stereotypes.

My question is still basically this: If you replaced this passage.

The former fieldhands acted as creatures of small intelligence might naturally be expected to do. Like monkeys or small children turned loose among treasured objects whose value is beyond their comprehension, they ran wild—either from perverse pleasure in destruction or simply because of their ignorance.

With this passage:

The Jews acted as creatures of devious manipulation as they might be naturally expected to do. As serpents or wolves turned loose on among sheep, they cheated and stole--either from perverse pleasure in destruction or simply because of their evil nature.

Would you keep reading? Would people ever call such a book "one of the greatest of all time?" Would people be able to "appreciate the story considering its context?" Would you be able to "appreciate the story considering its context?"

[Lamplight]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

I don't expect that at all. People can write all the stories about southern aristocrats they want. Those stories can even have slaves in them. Just don't resort to caricature and outright offensive distortion. Take, for example, the movie Sommersby with Richard Gere and Jodie Foster. They remained faithful to history and depicted blacks during the Reconstruction period without relying on ugly stereotypes.

And that's great, but that movie was released in the 1990s, not the 1930s. The 1930s were considerably more accepting of minorities than the 1800s, but still far less so than the 1990s, and I wouldn't expect a movie made in the 30s to be as sensitive or even necessarily as historically accurate as one made more recently. It could be, but I wouldn't expect it.

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

My question is still basically this: If you replaced this passage.



With this passage:



Would you keep reading? Would people ever call such a book "one of the greatest of all time?" Would people be able to "appreciate the story considering its context?" Would you be able to "appreciate the story considering its context?"

Sure I would, because I understand that an author could write such a thing without necessarily believing it him/herself. A story doesn't have to blatantly tell you that a particular viewpoint was held by the majority at the time, but not necessarily by the author. The author may believe that same thing, but he/she may not, too. I can write this:

Joe didn't approve of his son running around with black kids. They were lazy, filthy, and constantly stealing and lying, and the whole town would have been better off without them.

...without believing that any of those things are true. Most people could see that, while Joe wasn't actually saying those things, it's obvious that I was speaking of his attitude, or even the attitudes of most of the people in his town. Might I hold that same belief? I may, but that passage wouldn't necessarily indicate it. (I don't, BTW) I've seen this used countless times in literature. Just because it's not in quotation marks or directly states that a view is held by a character and not the author, doesn't mean the author holds that view. The author may, but it's not a guarantee one way or the other. Usually it's fairly obvious, sometimes it's not.

[Ohiogirl81]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

And whether you're depicting Jews as greedy, deceitful schemers "who got what was coming to them" or black slaves as shiftless, bumbling morons in the antebellum South "who needed to be kept in line," you're making light of the plight of a people.

No one is making light of anything. If you'd get off your little soapbox and actually read these posts, you'd realize that.

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

My problem is that over 70 years later people who do know better wholly ignore the blatant racism in Gone With The Wind and proffer a series of dishonest rationalizations for the glorification of the movie.

And my problem is with people who are too obtuse to understand that not only do other people have different tastes and opinions, but also that other people are able to watch a movie, digest its messages, place those messages within the context of the movie's subject matter and era of release, perhaps disagree with the movie's premises (or not) ... and still appreciate the acting and cinematography in the film.

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

Slavery was obviously opposed by northerners

Not all of them. Read up on your history texts.

Yep. And it just so happens that Mitchell's point of view is a racist one.

Did she tell you that? Do we know that what she wrote was her point of view? How do we know that?

[nightbird47]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

Slavery was obviously opposed by northerners and the Holocaust by the Allies. The point I was making is that it's not hard to see how atrocities occur because people have a sheep-like instinct. If everyone else is doing it, then people assume it has to be morally right on some level.

GWTW does not capture reality. That's the point. Do you think that Reconstruction was nothing but former slaves drinking whiskey and eating watermelon in Congress? Or that the Ku Klux Klan was formed because blacks were terrorizing white people? That's so ridiculous that I couldn't even write those sentences with a straight face.

Yep. And it just so happens that Mitchell's point of view is a racist one.

You obviously didn't see the distinction in the Hansel and Gretel example I provided upthread. Go back and consult that and then we can have a more fulsome discussion.

But you used a word which means nobody did. And it isn't true even if you only include the north or the allies. There were southerns involved in the underground railway who did more than just have their say. There were Germans who ended up dying in concentration camps or had their head cut off (the proscribed punishment for Germans who betrayed the Nazi's) who gave sancuary. Think of the movie Swing Kids. The swing kids were real and at risk to life and limb contiunued to use music (banned swing music) as a protest. Were they a majority? No. But they existed. Don't use absolute words unless you know they apply.

And the world DID know about the camps, including the British and Americans from smuggled pictures. They could have bombed the railway to Auschwitz and stopped the trains. They knew of American's and British pow's sent there. They did nothing. It was their perception that the best thing was to end the war. It's been debated and discussed since, often questioned. Life and answers are not simple and clear cut. Hindsight had shown more might have been done, but the fact is it was either a mistake or not, but that is a what if since its over.

And slavery wasn't just a southern condition. The ships who brought slaves were not from the south. The factories who bought the cotton were not in the south. Yes, I know the whole thing about how sheep let things happen. Go to an airport lately? People will cooperate or not act for many reasons, not necessarily because they see something as morally right. Fear and self preservation are good motivators too.

But the fact is that most will just go along, and live the normal and it is their right to. The south was not allowed to succeed not because they had slaves but to preserve the union. Go to the History forum and read some of the threads. But just saying they should have won't get you anywhere unless you have references.

GWTW (any movie with a theme) shows a personal sense of reality. And it was made in the 1930's when that was common. So does that make it evil now since its not usually percieved that way now? Today it would not be the same movie, but it wasn't made today. Today in all likelyhood it wouldn't be written the same at all. Nobody says you or anyone else has to agree with how it's presented, but it is a moment frozen in time. Yes, the author was rasist. Most people then were. But this makes what is a good story and a suburly made movie somehow evil? Art is an individual expression, and what you express is up to you. How the public takes it, if its ignored or becomes famous or anything inbetween is the choice of people voting with their feet.

If GWTW is still considered a classic and people still watch it means it appeals far beyond its time, and that is a choice of those who choose. If you don't, fine.

I understand how you differenchiate by how an author handles point of view. But I don't agree that it means the author is automatically in agreement. Narration is still from a characters point of view. If I wrote about the Ripper, I'd narrate in the same voice, but not have to find ways to include in characters lines what I want the reader to know (narration is a whole lot easier, but I like using direct sprinkles of information better). It's about style and the immediacy of a scene over what the writer is or believes. I can write a character who acts contrary to how I would without assuming that everyone will think I would.

If you don't like the movie, don't watch it but don't say that others shouldn't who see beyond the agendas. (today, with the drive to 'purify' the classics, and yesterday, the point of view of a time we might not like to admit to) A good story is still a good story.

[bs13690]

"Worst Movie Ever"? That's a bold statement. So I guess you've seen every other movie ever made?

[goodlife36]

I enjoyed it. We need more epic love stories.

[gentlearts]

This movie must be viewed from the perspective of the times when it was made. For one thing, I believe that it was way more exciting visually than anything movies viewers had seen at the time. So we aren't just too jaded to appreciate the plot, but we're too jaded by the modern movie experiences to think it was special.

[JimRom]

I was taking this topic seriously at first, but I've come to realize that the OP doesn't want to discuss it, just to convert everyone to his way of thinking.

Unfortunately, the premise of the post is wrong. GWTW isn't the worst movie ever. I'm fairly sure that Dumb and Dumber holds that spot. Or possibly a Will Ferrel movie.

[SCGranny]

Wonder if the OP has ever read "Little Black Sambo" or any of Kipling's works?

"Little Black Sambo" was banned in the US, even though it depicted an intelligent black African child, who thought and reasoned his way out of difficulties, because of the 'derogatory stereotypes' inclusive in its pages. Kipling had 'prejudiced' viewpoints, even though they evinced the attitude of the times.

By trying to objectify and 'purify' the past, we reduce the lessons learned from history to mere politically-correct rejections of anything that does not agree with those who consider themselves 'more enlightened'. Those who do not strive to understand the past - with all of its lessons, ideas, ideals, and interpretations in context - are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. People with a superficial and instantly judgemental attitude of "But... But... it shouldn't have happened that way, people don't think that way!" close their minds as to how people can come to those thoughts and interpretations. And so the cycle can be repeated.

You won't learn that from Will Ferrell or LiLo. It's like pretending that the world didn't exist until you were born to make sense of it all - you are not open to other information, only to what you deem appropriate and applicable, simply because your limited birth-to-now experience is the only stick by which you are able to measure.

What depths to which the educational system has fallen... sigh.

[D217]

I agree. The movie sucks.