I haven’t seen it is a while. What was the racist portion of Fantasia?
Somewhat ironic that GWTW is criticized as racist today, but at the time was the vehicle for a Black woman winning an Oscar.
(emphasis added) That is a very good observation. The production and performances were at top of the game and it was a huge hit, so yes, a grand display of the form. The content though is just peak Lost Cause romanticizing and a lot of the grandness was made affordable because those in charge knew, from the book sales, that this would sell many tickets if they told it using a cast of stars and spectacular shots.
Looking back, Birth of a Nation comes across as blatantly in your face partisan agitprop, while GWTW, in fine Daughters of the Confederacy Lost Cause manner, is stylish and “classy” and bless-your-heart condescending. “Birth…” was more of a major pioneering work from the film maker’s craft perspective while GWTW was a model for how to make a blockbuster.
I don’t yet know what implications this would have with the broader topic, but I very much do not like this framing. Racism (or bigotry in general) is not merely something we “dislike today” or that makes any students feel bad. It is wrong at a fundamental level.
Yes, the “anti-woke” people love to claim these sort of topics are about erasing things from history, but that’s not the issue. It’s about how we acknowledge something without perpetuating or glorifying it. And it’s about accepting the good while rejecting (but not erasing) the bad.
Again, I don’t know how much that actually changes the discussion on whether Gone With the Wind should be called “great” or on “Great film” lists. That I think is more about what is meant by “great.” But deciding it doesn’t fit would not be pretending something doesn’t exist in order to avoid offending.
Birth of a Nation still exists, even if it isn’t on such lists. People can still study what artistic merit it has without it being on such lists.
If you search for Fantasia racist scene, you’ll see it. I don’t remember ever seeing that character, so I think it was cut out of the VHS and DVD versions that I’ve seen.
As for my thoughts on the OP:
I have to admit, I’ve never seen Gone With the Wind. I knew it had some racist elements, but was not aware it was a racist film in its entirety. I’d just heard about racist depictions of black people.
And I think at least some of that is that it is usually treated as a great film. While it’s not assumed that a great film from the past will necessarily be racism-free, I do think that term implies that you can somehow remove the racism and it would be good. So that’s a strike against it.
Fantasia is a good example. I know they removed a racist depiction of black fawns with stereotypical features who acted like servants to the white fauns. Looking at some stills, apparently one was a zebra.
It really doesn’t affect the segment (The Pastoral Symphony) or the film as a whole. That’s more what I’d expect from a so-called “great” film.
It’s the character of the “pickaninny” centauress called “Sunflower”, highlighted in these scenes censored from the current version:
It’s pretty obvious why she’s considered objectionable – she’s such a stereotyped character.
I note, on the other hand, that they didn’t censor the black zebra centauresses, who are undoubtedly cool.
Thanks for the Fantasia link.
I’ve been thinking similar thoughts WRT fiction. 19th century British fiction (Austen, Bronte, Hardy, Trollope…) has long been among my fave. But lately, I find it hard to get past the blatant classism. The “heroes” of so many of these works just KNOW they are better and entitled to live lives of leisure as a result of their accident of birth. I still love the language, but I view the characters differently than I did in decades past.
There is also the issue of judging a work by the mores of when it was produced, and the time period it represents. Today, in 2024, we are discussing a movie made in 1939 based on a 1936 book, portraying events in the 1860s. Which century’s mores ought to apply?
Since Black people were protesting it at the time, maybe by the mores of the time it was released?
I don’t mean to be flippint. People are understandably offended by the racism of GwtW and other movies. I’m offended by them as well. There’s a scene in GwtW where some of the menfolk, post-war, are talking about the indignities they’re suffering at the hands of carpetbaggers and the like, and on one viewing I realized they must be including things like blacks voting. A lot of films from the past are also rather sexist. GwtW has a controversial scene where Rett “takes” Scarlet for example with many people today feeling as though it’s condoning sexual assault.
And this is where I fundamentally disagree. If we’re just talking about a casual list of great movies by some regular Joe, fine, leave Birth off the list. Even racist today don’t want to watch Birth because it is mind numbingly boring. Seriously, I cannot stress just how goddamn boring that movie really is. If we’re talking about a list put together by academics who study film and film history then Birth absolutely belongs on the list. Leaving it off the list because we don’t like it’s content is sticking our heads in the sand and pretending it doesn’t exist. Better to talk about it than ignore it.
I more or less look at GOTW the same way that I look at Michael Jackson’s music or Bill Cosby’s comedy, which is something that’s still entertaining, but that must be enjoyed with the knowledge that the performer/artist’s behavior was absolutely unacceptable.
But that doesn’t make it not good music or funny comedy. It’s hard not to sing along with “Billie Jean” or laugh at Cosby’s chocolate cake for breakfast sequence. Enjoying either doesn’t automatically condone their behavior.
With GOTW, I don’t look at it any different than I do at any other movie that’s out of its time and has elements that are socially unacceptable today. For example, Revenge of the Nerds is still funny, although there are elements that aren’t acceptable by today’s standards. Same with Animal House, Porky’s, and a whole legion of other movies and TV shows from decades past.
Hell, I was rewatching a bunch of Simpsons episodes recently, and was really torn about Apu- on one hand, the character was undeniably funny, and in the time the series was originally set, there were indeed a lot of Indian convenience store clerks. That’s why The Simpsons made Apu, that’s why Encino Man had their Indian clerks, etc… And the joke was funny at the time, if a bit racist today. But it doesn’t invalidate the whole show or even episodes involving Apu. It’s just something to watch out for and keep in mind, not something to get into high dudgeon about and not watch it.
Correcting my earlier typo, this film is “Gone With The Wind” (GWTW) not “Game Of The Wind” (GOTW).
But this is just wrong. Not putting something on a list is not pretending it doesn’t exist. It is deciding it doesn’t meet the criteria for that list. It’s not forbidding people from discussing that film. Just like taking down a statue of something is not pretending that the event didn’t happen. It’s saying it doesn’t fit the criteria to be a statue.
History is not so fragile that simply not mentioning something erases it. And while there are some contexts where actually discussing racist depictions is useful, there are others where it is not. History is not harmed when it is not discussed. That Wikipedia article, with all the facts is still there. You can still go watch the film in its entirety and read tons of discussion about it.
And, again, I object to calling it “content we don’t like.” This is racism. It does not matter if I like it or not. It’s wrong and harmful. Any decision about it has to weigh the harm of once again displaying that racism.
Perhaps this analogy would help: No one would say child porn is just content we don’t want to see. It’s child porn. Its very production and viewing causes harm. It would only be viewed in specific circumstances where the harm in not viewing it is greater than the harm of seeing it.
And, no, I’m not saying the two are equivalent. I’m using CP as an example to try and get across why I object to calling it “content we don’t like.” That paradigm treats other people’s reactions as the problem. But CP is something nearly all agree is harmful in and of itself.
And that changes the calculation. A list that leaves out a film simply because it has a part I don’t like would be deficient. One that leaves out a racist film because whatever other values do not override the harm of its racism? That’s completely different.
I similarly object to when people treat racism as just “offensive content.” I think all of these make it about reactions rather than about the fact that racism is harmful. And I hope my explanation makes it clear why I don’t consider this just a semantic argument.
Where do you draw the line though? Racism isn’t special, in the sense that it’s not worse than sexism, ableism, or most of the other “isms”. And those things pop up in movies throughout the historical record.
Nobody in 2024 is going to be swayed by any racist content in GWTW into thinking something they didn’t already think. And IMO, we’re being a bit special snowflakey if we’re being particularly offended by a movie that’s 85 years old, based on a 88 year old novel that was set roughly 160 years ago dealing with the South and the . Of course it’s going to have racist elements; how could a halfway accurate historical movie set in the South NOT have offensive depictions of racism?
I don’t see why they can’t be great.
I think too many poor judgements are made under the umbrellas of ‘presentism.’ Even the most progressive of us are doing, saying or writing things today that our grandchildren will cringe at. Should we be judged by the mores of today or of those of 2100?
Yeah I think this is a separate discussion that has nothing to with racism. To say something is very influential and the techniques it pioneered were used by a lot of what came after it, is NOT the same as saying something is great. I’d say this applies to both Triumph of the Will and Birth of a Nation.
E.g. I recognize Pet Sounds pioneered a lot of the production techniques that were later used by bands like the Beatles. But that does not make it a ‘great’ album IMO it’s a decent album with a couple of good songs, not remotely in the same league as Sergeant Pepper.
But apparently Black people were protesting GWTW at the time. It just seems like too much of this is ignoring the views of Black people who knew it was racist back in the 40s.
I remember reading on this very board about attitudes of Southerners during the Civil War and someone pointed out that no one asked the slaves what they thought at the time. Opened my eyes to my own unintended racism.
My point being, it’s not presentism to say it’s racist – it was racist then, and the people who were affected by it knew it then.
Yeah this is a good point. The extreme example of this is Dambusters. There are no racist themes or even, (typically for a 1950s British movie) any black characters. However the main character’s dog which does have a significant part in the movie, is named the n-word (as the actual historical dog was). That is definitely horribly racist and I’ve no problem editing the movie to remove the name. But does it exclude Dambusters from being a great movie? (I think it is a great movie, as does George Lucas to whom it was big influence). The dogs name has absolutely nothing to do with the plot or themes of the movie.
Also doesn’t this exclude any black actor from taking a significant role in a “great” Hollywood movie prior to basically the 1960s? Hattie McDaniel won the first Oscar for an African American for gone with the wind (though she did receive criticism for it from the black community at the time)
When was the first depiction of a significant black character (not just there to provide musical relief and drinks for the white main characters, like Sam in Casablanca) in a widely released American movie, that would not be considered racist today?
If we’re ranking films of the twentieth century based on their cultural significance and technical innovations and leave off Birth of a Nation because we don’t like its message we’re just burying our heads in the sand and pretending it doesn’t exist. You’re pretending it didn’t have an influence on motion pictures that came after it.
There are an awful lot of LGBTQ+ people who would disagree with you when it comes to erasure.
The reason I refer to it as “content we don’t like” is because the issue isn’t just limited to racism. The idea that anyone is harmed by those particular words is silly beyond belief.
I don’t think GWTW is “racist”. Its goal (IMO) isn’t to further the cause of racism. Racism was, and is, a real thing that shaped people’s beliefs and actions. You can’t ignore it.
It’s a very good movie about very bad people. In that sense, it’s no different from The Godfather. Or Laurence of Arabia. I hate the glorification of mobsters.
Is it racist to make a modern WWII film with segregated units? And filmmakers and audiences still can’t agree on what to do with the poor dog with an unfortunate name in The Dambusters.
The fact that the South (and, America in general) hasn’t moved on from the racism of 1939 doesn’t change whatever quality GWTW may or may not have.