Gone with the Wind screening report

Gone with the wind screening report

1.     Relate what was discussed in class or the text to the screening

In class we talked about the golden age of Hollywood film, which lasted from the late 1930’s to around 1941 at the beginning of world war two. Gone with the wind is probably the most notable of those films besides Citizen Kane. Gone with the wind still has the highest box office gross in film history after being adjusted for inflation, this shows how impactful and long lasting these great Hollywood films could be to audiences.

2.     Find a related article and summarize the content

In the article gone with the Wind and Hollywood’s racial politics the author Leonard Leff talks about the issue of African Americans in film. David Selznick called it the “negro problem” about how to utilize African Americans in the production of Gone with the Wind. The film in the end utilized black actors but under the guise of white authorities on black psychology, which helped to reinforce the old and dangerous stereotypes pertaining to the old south and African Americans.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1999/12/gone-with-the-wind-and-hollywoods-racial-politics/377919/

3.     Apply the article to the film screened in class

Gone with the wind was a film concerning the civil war and reconstruction from the perspective of white southern plantation owners and the African American’s shown within the film all exist within a mentality that fits within the white southerner? The slaves are all content with their place in society and not concerned with things such as freedom from their emancipation. They were content with working for their slave masters and knew that their master knew best for them and their protection. Media portrayals such as these have led to people even today claiming that African Americans had it better during the slavery era then they do today under the thumb of government aid. Many of these people who say this with a straight face are politicians or politician candidates in the south.

4.     Write a critical analysis of the film, including your personal opinion, formed as a result of the screening, class discussions, text material and the article.

Gone with the wind is a technical and cultural masterpiece from an era where things were done bigger and better than possibly dreamed about before hand but unfortunately that also includes its poor portrayals of African Americans which further expanded upon the negative stereotypes films like birth of a nation helped to normalize to the viewers. As birth of a nation led to the rise in the popularity the Klu Klux Klan in the era of Jim Crow laws, Gone with the Wind helped solidify negative images of African Americans on the cusp of the Civil rights era. Many people including the producers of the film as well as Elanore Roosavelt screened the film screened the film for African Americans to gauge their responses to the slave portrayals and the reactions were very split with many people feeling that the negative representation was bad but at least there were some great black actors who had a change to shine in a huge Hollywood blockbuster. I believe that even today a film as magnificent as gone with the wind can still divide audiences over the portrayals of the slaves and its implications on society at the time.   

CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM 

1) ( x ) I have not handed in this assignment for any other class. 

2) (x  ) If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper. 

3) (x  ) If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text. 

4) (x  ) I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper. 

5) ( x ) I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read. 

6) (  x) I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography. 

7) ( x ) I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality. 

8) (  x) I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper. 



Name: _______________Matthew Larue__________  Date: ________10/22/14_________