Should Disney release "Song of the South"?

[Nars_Glinley]

Currently, Song of the South is locked securely in Disney’s vault and AFAIK won’t be released anytime soon, if ever. Should it be let out?

IMHO yes. Keeping it locked up makes as much sense as keeping kids from reading Mark Twain.

[Inner_Stickler]

No. It’s boring as hell.

[silenus]

Sure. Historical value, if nothing else.

[GuanoLad]

I don’t desire a copy, but I also don’t see what the big deal is. Disney can be too precious sometimes.

[Rodgers01]

Sure, at least on DVD/Bluray. They can be smart about it, and not throw it in the mix with their other catalogue titles lest impressionable kiddies pick it up with Bambi and Pinocchio. But it should at least be available on order for adults who want to buy it.

[bienville]

I got a chance to watch it again about a year ago. It’s really not that racist.

The manner in which the characterizations are racist is the “happy simple folk” kind of stereotype which is certainly better than the “gonna rape your white daughters” stereotype. During that era, almost all attempts at “positive” portrayals of black people fall into the “happy simple folk” characterization. So, Song of the South really doesn’t stand out as a racist film.

Now, the other thing that stood out to me when I watched was this:
This movie is really bad. It’s just a stupid boring horrible movie. My theory is that Disney is just using “cultural sensitivity” as an excuse. The real reason they don’t want to release it is that they don’t want people to realized what a horrible movie it is.

The animated sequences are great. This is what everyone remembers from the movie. They remember the animated sequences and they remember that the animated sequences are great. This is why people lament “Oh! Why won’t Disney release Song of the South!?” For the most part, everyone who really wants to be able to watch the movie will ultimately be disappointed should they ever actually get the chance to view it.

That is the major backlash Disney would be faced with.

So, I am going to vote for “I don’t like black and white questions.”
They should make all the animated sequences available on shorts compilation sets. The animated sequences have, I believe, been available in this way in years past. I don’t know if they are currently available in this way.

The whole movie? I don’t think it should be erased from existence, but if they don’t want to release it I see no reason why they should.

[Mr.Accident]

They should definitely release it. Its no worse than Birth of a Nation, or Reefer Madness, and both of those are far more racist.

[JLRogers]

A cursory check shows that it’s available for free on the web anyway. It’s not legal to watch it that way in the US, but as long as Disney refuses to monetize the property people are going to use that route. They might as well release it with a “take this in historical context” warning as has been done with some classic cartoons.

[Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker]

Well, it was released legally in the UK on VHS, and in Asia on LaserDisc. I have a UK copy. Having said that, as an adult watching it. . . it’s just not that good, in my opinion. The musical numbers are, but the connecting storyline I didn’t care much for.

[CalMeacham]

Yes. I have a copy dubbed from the UK version (as noted, it has been released outside the US), and I saw it theatrically on one of its lasat releases.
It certainly is the product of its time, recalling a time when minstrel shows were the norm and all, and can be seen to suggest that slavery wasn’t all that bad. Nevertheless, the film isn’t clear about exactly when it takes place (although Disney stated that it’s set after the Civil War. I don’t recall anything in the film making that clear), nobody is ever said to be a slave, and the film doesn’t promote slavery or racism. You can argue that the animals are stereotypical “black” characters, but in my opinion, it doesn’t wash – one reason children’s psychological tests use animals is to erase etghnic differences. You can make a case for the crows in Dumbo being black stereotypes, but Br’er Fox, Br’er Bear, and Br’er Rabbit are just “Southern”.
(And that “Tar Baby” isn’t a put-down of blacks, either. It’s in the original Joel Chandler Harris story. “Tar” is just the ultra-sticky substance required for the creature that Br’er Rabbit gets stuck too. In the original African tale, it’s sticky plant resin applied to a calabash that holds Hare or Anansi in place. Well, in the South, Pine Tar was the commercial sticky plant resin sold in industrial quantities.)
James Baskett did a great job singing, dancing, and interacting with the animated characters. His avuncular personality was in line with other period depictions of friendly blacks, but it wasn’t demeaning. A meaningful comment on the age was that, as a black, he was unable to attend the festivities at the film’s premiere in Atlanta. Black reaction to the film was mixed and controversial:

Even early in the film’s production, there was concern that the material would encounter controversy. Disney publicist Vern Caldwell wrote to producer Perce Pearce that “the negro situation is a dangerous one. Between the negro haters and the negro lovers there are many chances to run afoul of situations that could run the gamut all the way from the nasty to the controversial.”[2]

When the film was first released, Walter Francis White, the executive secretary of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) telegraphed major newspapers around the country with the following statement:
“The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People recognizes in ‘Song of the South’ remarkable artistic merit in the music and in the combination of living actors and the cartoon technique. It regrets, however, that in an effort neither to offend audiences in the north or south, the production helps to perpetuate a dangerously glorified picture of slavery. Making use of the beautiful Uncle Remus folklore, ‘Song of the South’ unfortunately gives the impression of an idyllic master-slave relationship which is a distortion of the facts.”[5]
White however had not yet seen the film; his statement was based on memos he received from two NAACP staff members who attended a press screening on November 20, 1946, Norma Jensen and Hope Springarn. Jensen had written that the film was “so artistically beautiful that it is difficult to be provoked over the clichés” but that it contained “all the clichés in the book,” mentioning that she felt scenes like blacks singing traditional black songs were offensive as a stereotype. Springarn listed several things she found objectionable from the film, including the Negro dialect.[5]

“Both Jensen and Springarn were also confused” by the film’s Reconstruction setting, states Jim Hill Media, writing that “It was something that also confused other reviewers who from the tone of the film and the type of similar recent Hollywood movies [Gone with the Wind; Jezebel] assumed it must also be set during the time of slavery.” Based on the Jensen and Springarn memos, White released the “official position” of the NAACP in a telegram that was widely quoted in newspapers.[29] The New York Times’ Bosley Crowther, mentioned above, made a similar assumption, writing that the movie was a “travesty on the antebellum South.”[30]

In the same vein, Time magazine, also mentioned above, cautioned that “the picture was bound to land its maker in hot water,” because the character of Uncle Remus was “bound to enrage all educated Negroes and a number of damyankees.”[31] Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., a congressman from Harlem, branded the film an “insult to American minorities” and “everything that America as a whole stands for.”[32] The National Negro Congress even went as far as to set up picket lines in theaters in the big cities where the film played, with its protesters holding signs that read “Song of the South is an insult to the Negro people” and, lampooning “Jingle Bells,” chanted: “Disney tells, Disney tells/lies about the South.”[32] Even the Jewish community was turned off by the film; the B’nai B’rith Messenger of Los Angeles branded the film as “tall[ying] with the reputation that Disney is making for himself as an arch-reactionary.”

At the same time, however, some black printed material had mixed reactions on what they thought of Song of the South. While Richard B. Dier in The Afro-American was “thoroughly disgusted” by the film for being “as vicious a piece of propaganda for white supremacy as Hollywood ever produced,” Herman Hill in The Pittsburgh Courier felt that Song of the South would “prove of inestimable goodwill in the furthering of interracial relations.” Reviewing the negative aspects of the film, Ebony magazine considered such criticisms to be “unadulterated hogwash symptomatic of the unfortunate racial neurosis that seems to be gripping so many of our humorless brethren these days.”

The Disney Company has stated that, like Harris’ book, the film takes place after the American Civil War and that all the African American characters in the movie are no longer slaves.[15] The Hays Office had asked Disney to “be certain that the frontispiece of the book mentioned establishes the date in the 1870s,” however, the final film carried no such statement.[5]

Song of the South

Disney understandably tries to avoid any controversy or potentially negative imagery, so I can nunderstand their unwillingness to let this one out of the Vault, at least in the US. Heck, they’re still sitting on Der Fuehrer’s Face from World War II, undoubtedly because of its extreme caricatures of Germans, Italians, and Japanese (I have a bootleg copy). I was severely disappointed that “Cartoons got to War” showed virtually nothing of this historically important cartoon.

[Sampiro]

I agree with the “historical value if nothing else”. Among other things, James Baskett won an Oscar for this movie, the first black actor to win one; one of his co-stars in the film was Hattie McDaniel, the first black actress to win an Oscar. (Her Oscar went missing in the 1960s; I wonder what happened to his.)
Plus, the Uncle Remus tales preserved some very important African-American (in its truest sense- a total blend of two cultures) folklore that could well have been completely lost if Harris had not written it down, and imho the dialect was essential to recording them accurately. If they filmed this today you’d get “computerey” animation and some kind of Esperanto-ish accents and there’d be nothing to tack it down to a place and time that it sprang from and could scarcely have existed in the same form outside of.

[Rubixcube]

@CalMeacham

Disney understandably tries to avoid any controversy or potentially negative imagery, so I can nunderstand their unwillingness to let this one out of the Vault, at least in the US. Heck, they’re still sitting on Der Fuehrer’s Face from World War II, undoubtedly because of its extreme caricatures of Germans, Italians, and Japanese (I have a bootleg copy).

They released that, along with most (all?) of their other WW2 cartoons, on the On the Front Lines set from the Treasures line. Odds are that they’ll release Song of the South in a similar way. Limited edition aimed at collectors with a long condescending introduction by Leonard Maltin.

I do think that it should be released. To put it bluntly, Song of the South isn’t nearly as bad as it’s made out to be, and Disney have released plenty of material of a similar nature via their Treasures releases. The main reason Song of the South is specifically excluded is because of the reputation it’s got, not the content itself.

[Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker]

Some other notes:

James Baskett was only 42 when he was playing the ancient “Uncle Remus,” and in poor health with a bad ticker. He wouldn’t live to see 50. I wonder if he has any living descendants?

He also played Gabby Gibson in the “Amos ‘n’ Andy” radio program, and there are several other A&A regulars supplying voices in SotS.

[ministryman]

First, the black and white thing…I saw what you did…

Second, I think Disney should release it, but insert a disclaimer like this:

“To all of our African-American fans and customers: We hope this disclaimer satisfies you and that you will continue to spend your hard-earned dollars at our theme parks.”

“The events portrayed in this movie are fictionalized, and do not depict the brutality of American Slavery. Slavery was bad. Slaves did not dance around all day thanking their masters for a job that paid meager wages. That would not come until 1955, when Disneyland was built.”

[ministryman]

@JLRogers

A cursory check shows that it’s available for free on the web anyway. It’s not legal to watch it that way in the US, but as long as Disney refuses to monetize the property people are going to use that route. They might as well release it with a “take this in historical context” warning as has been done with some classic cartoons.

pssst…link? hello?

[Inner_Stickler]

Dude, he’s talking about torrents.

[Rodgers01]

@Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker

Some other notes:

James Baskett was only 42 when he was playing the ancient “Uncle Remus,” and in poor health with a bad ticker. He wouldn’t live to see 50. I wonder if he has any living descendants?

He also played Gabby Gibson in the “Amos ‘n’ Andy” radio program, and there are several other A&A regulars supplying voices in SotS.

42?! Holy cow…did they dye his hair?

His costar, Bobby Driscoll, had what must be the prototypical tragic child actor story. His Wikipedia page makes for very interesting reading.

[MilTan]

Actually, the whole thing is available on YouTube, as the most obvious search terms turn up.

[Spoke]

@Sampiro

Plus, the Uncle Remus tales preserved some very important African-American (in its truest sense- a total blend of two cultures) folklore that could well have been completely lost if Harris had not written it down…

Arguably a blend of three cultures, since the Cherokee had a “trickster rabbit” storytelling tradition. More here. And here.

[CalMeacham]

Cottie Burland made the same argument in North American Indian Mythology. It could certainly be a contributing element, but I observe that the Joel Chandler Harris tales have parallels not only in trickster rabbits, but have the same plots, as well. The American Indian trickster rabbit tales I’ve read don’t share the Br’er Rabbit plots.