Gone With the Wind (1939) Essay

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She fights to save Tara against the Yankees with Scarlett -- although the Union forces are fighting against slavery, an inconvenient fact the film frequently tries to make the viewer forget. Mammy allies herself with Scarlett during Reconstruction, "pushing aside renegade blacks" so her mistress can pass them on the street, as if slavery never ended (Bogle 89). Much of the humor in Gone with the Wind comes from the 'world upside down' idea that a black woman can be far stronger and wiser than her masters, more socially conscious about status and divisions between whites and blacks, although McDaniel does have lines that are dry, ironic and funny in their own right like the hard-drinking Scarlett is "prostrate with grief" over the death of her second husband (Bogle 89).

The film also essentially claims that despite of the pervasiveness of African-Americans in Southern society, African-Americans are only worthy subjects to the degree which their fate intersects with whites. None of the brutality of the slave system is in evidence -- the only example of this is what seems like a deserved slap to Prissy, versus the burning of Atlanta and the horrific scenes in the military hospital of men having their limbs amputated without anesthetic.

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The destruction of the plantation system is portrayed in terms of Scarlett's loss of innocence and beauty and the loss of a simpler way of life, not the eradication of a system of human bondage. The film forces Scarlett to accept hard truths about the nature of her supposed feelings for Ashley Wilkes, but never encourages viewers to confront the reality of slavery and racial discrimination: 'good' blacks ally themselves with whites, and 'bad' blacks do not. While questions about what constitutes good Southern womanhood are contested in the behavior of Scarlett vs. Melanie, there is no debate as to who are the 'good' African-Americans in the film: those that serve, like Mammy, not those who fight for freedom.

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