Salon.com: According to a report published on Deadline, the Orpheum Theatre in Memphis, Tennessee has pulled the classic 1939 film “Gone With the Wind” from its schedule after determining that it was “insensitive to a large segment of its local population.”
Statements from the management of the Orpheum note that there had been a broad and often negative local response to the August 11 screening of the Academy-Award winning tale of the Civil War Era South starring Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable.
2 comments:
This article hits points that have been overlooked for far too long in the entertainment industry dealing with racism in a broader sense. Often times, African American slaves are portrayed within movies, tv shows, and plays, as almost objects or just a small device used to display the time period. This is also shown in Sofia Coppola's new movie, "The Beguiled", where slaves are merely used almost as setting. I believe that the theater did the right thing at the time by dropping this production, due to to the fact that the United States has denied the hardships of African Americans throughout history, and in this day and age ignorance is almost as bad as blatant racism itself. Drama is supposed to hold a mirror up to the world, not turn a blind eye to the realities of it.
While preserving the cultural integrity of art, especially art created or centered around times that we consider shameful, is important, I am not convinced that “Gone with the Wind” is the best movie to articulate Southern life as it was surrounding the civil war. It gives a very clear image of the white idealization of that time period but does not accurately capture the times to the standard that would be necessary for a movie such as this one to still find itself relevant. I understand the cultural significance as movies such as this. However when these movies are separated from the healthy essential dialogue about the poor representations and negative affects on our nations cultural psyche, movies that poorly portray eras of human genocide should not be screened. The theatre made the right choice in my opinion. "Gone With the Wind" is insensitive and harbors storytelling that me and countless other black (bulk) people find offensive and downright hurtful.
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