After including the film in its summer movie schedule year after year, in 2017 the Orpheum Theater, in Memphis, suddenly decided that Gone With the Wind had to be yanked from the slate and never shown again.
Why? Because the “pro-choice” mob decided this was yet another choice they would have to make for you–you can’t be trusted to choose correctly on your own. And they will decide what’s correct or not.
All this high-handed bullying and vandalism gets pitched to us as “social justice” etc. Only leftids can give a bad name to “justice.”
Remember: when they say “choice,” it means “my way or no way!”
If you loved in a different era, you lived to different standards. When I was a young child, growing up in a northern tier state, there wasn’t a lot of racial hatred, but occasionally one would run into it. In the Deep South of the mid 19th century, there were attitudes which would seem quite foreign and wrong to us, and I agree heartily, that these attitudes were wrong, but does that mean that we shouldn’t watch a movie that portrays what was happening in that time and place?
I think that the Holocaust was one of the most terrible things that ever happened, but I’m not going to suggest that we should never watch a movie that portrays those events. In fact, I see good reason to watch such a movie, because it serves as a warning of just how easily the unconscionable can arise. If I watch a movie about the South in the time of slavery, I’m not cheering-on the practice of slavery. To the contrary, I would see it as a cautionary lesson.
But even more to the point, Gone With the Wind is not real. It’s a movie! I have a copy of Superman III, but that doesn’t make me believe that I can fly. If I watch a movie about a historic event, or historic figure, I am still seeing what the director chose to present, and that means there will likely be personal biases involved. Movies; all movies, have to tell a complex story in a relatively short amount of time. Much is left out, and impressions are cast, leaving the viewer to fill in the blanks and quite possibly make leaps of logic.
It’s easy to take movies far too seriously, and I know that I had to learn this, for myself. Movies aren’t real, and should be taken no more seriously than a fairy tale. In fact, I would argue that a movie is just that; an elaborate fairy tale. We should choose our fairy tales carefully. If someone habitually watches movies that glorify indecency, it could turn into a bad influence. Actually, I see a far greater danger in getting caught up in fantasy.
There’s nothing wrong with fantasy, but there are people, for example, who live in the world of the Star Wars series of movies. When I hear someone talk about their “spidey sense”, I feel like vomiting. I actually saw the first Spider-Man movie, because a friend invited me along, but I don’t base my life on that movie. Or, for that matter, any other movie. I love The Right Stuff, but it’s very inaccurate, even to the point of being misleading. I loved Spies Like Us, but I don’t believe that the government would hire a couple of goofballs as decoy spies, and that those goofballs would end up saving the day. It’s a movie; a fairy tale.
Once upon a time I was listening to Sean Hannity report on how many people don’t know the words to the National Anthem. He soon got a call from some dindle who asserted that “The Movies” were HIS country, and threw at Hannity a lot of movie trivia. His point was, who needs The Star-Spangled Banner when you’ve gpt… movies?
Never heard the like of it before.
That is disturbing. If another movie were never produced, it would have very little effect on my life. Anyone that think movies are his nation, is living in a world of make believe.
Pathetic!
Muchos agreedamundo! (A bit of Spanglish 🙂 )
For years, I’ve been puzzled by the number of people I’ve met who live in the fantasy world of movie fandom. I like good movies, and have some strong favorites, but I don’t base my life around these. Frankly, even my absolute favorites have a quite minor role in my life.
Remember that you’re talking to a guy who writes fantasy novels.
There’s nothing wrong with fantasy, so long as we know that fantasy is not reality. What bothers me is when people carry their fantasy back into reality. You obviously have created a rich fantasy world in Obann, but you are capable of relating to the real world without constantly referring to your characters. That, as I see it, is a positive indication that you have a line of demarcation and that you have a healthy relationship with the fantasies you have written.
Unfortunately, there are people who do not have a demarcation between fantasy entertainment and real life, and that’s what I object to. There are people who so strongly identify with certain movies that you have to wonder if that has become the source of their personal identity. People line up to see another endless sequel to some Sci Fi pic, sometimes wearing elaborate costumes to resemble characters in those movies. Personally, I find that ridiculous. I don’t mind being a fan of a movie, but I’m not about to stand in line for hours in order to see a movie on the very day it’s released.
It’s like alcohol. There’s nothing wrong with alcohol, but it has to be used properly. I can’t get up in the morning and start my day with a sxouple of martinis, then drive into the office. If I were to do that, it would be misuse of alcohol. OTOH, if I had a drink in the evening, after work, that would not necessarily be a problem. If someone wants to watch a series of Sci Fi movies, or some other form of fantasy entertainment, that is their right, but they need to be able to operate in the real world, too.
I try to use fantasy as C.S. Lewis used it–as a way of viewing reality from an unusual vantage point that allows certain things to be seen more clearly than they usually are.
… and I’m all for that.