In 1939, David O Selznick produced a film of Margaret Mitchell’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Gone with the Wind. The movie proved to be among the most important in the history of world cinema. To this day, in fact, it remains the American box office champion when adjusted for inflation. In 1940, the film won a record-breaking eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture. Recently, however, Gone with the Wind has increasingly come under fire due to allegations of racism in the movie. Consequently, its reputation has fallen in many critical circles.
The film tells the story of a Southern family who fight on the side of the Confederacy in the American Civil War. Scarlett O’Hara, the main character, is a slave owner whose civilization goes to war to preserve the right to own and degrade African Americans. Life before the Civil War, during the days of slavery, is depicted as a golden age.
Scarlett’s maid and confidante, Mammy, is not even given a first name in the script. Meanwhile, Butterfly McQueen, who portrayed Prissy, a house servant whom Scarlett slaps across the face at one point in the film, was told by the director to deliver a hysterical performance emphasizing the character’s dim-wittedness, speaking to age-old negative stereotypes. Civil rights activist Malcolm X wrote of his embarrassment seeing Butterfly McQueen’s performance as Prissy that it made him want to crawl under the rug of the theater.
For all of these reasons, when watching Gone with the Wind today, modern viewers cannot help but feel admiration for how far the movie industry has come since its infancy. There is much to be embarrassed about in the early days of Hollywood films.
Hollywood has come a long way since its inception. Things we consider politically incorrect today were not so obvious back in the day. Racism, though portrayed artistically, is not tolerated today in the american film industry. According to the passage, the highly acclaimed films of the past like Gone with the Wind, which are alleged to be racist in some aspects have therefore come under criticism in todays times. The lecturer however, disagrees with the contention that the movie was racist and proves her point by providing explanation to counter the alleged problems in the movie the passage takes issue with.
To begin with, the professor thinks that critics have overstated the racism in Gone with the Wind. This is because she thinks that the movie just portrays a time when slavery was prevalent but the movie never supports it. The professor rather thinks that the movie has feminist undertones as the opportunities for women are shown to be turned for better after the cold war.
Then the professor counters the passage's taking issue with the maid not having a first name in the movie. According to the professor, regardless of the fact that she didnt have a first name the character of Mammy was the smartest one and was one of the richest and most complex charaters portrayed in the movie.
Similarly, the professor thinks that critics have failed to see an important aspect of the character Prissy. The rebellious, discontent with unfair authority and not afraid to disobey commands Prissy is lost due to the hysteria that was demonstrated in the acting may be because of the high pitched voice.
In the lecture, the professor talks about all the positive impact Gone with the Wind has had on Hollywood. It paved the way for African-American actors of that time into the industry as it was difficult for them to find acting jobs at that time especially by nominating the actress who played Mammy for an Oscar who won the award against white competitors. And so the professor thinks Gone with the Wind is not guilty of the charges today's critics allege it of.
| Post date | Users | Rates | Link to Content |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-01-15 | NoorZia | 70 | view |
| 2019-10-02 | rahulsingh773 | 3 | view |
| 2019-08-28 | michaelallen | 80 | view |
| 2019-08-08 | FERIDE08 | 70 | view |
| 2019-01-28 | toppoki | 81 | view |
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 9, column 167, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: didn't
...fessor, regardless of the fact that she didnt have a first name the character of Mamm...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, however, if, may, similarly, so, then, therefore, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 16.0 10.4613686534 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 1.0 5.04856512141 20% => OK
Conjunction : 6.0 7.30242825607 82% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 12.0772626932 108% => OK
Pronoun: 20.0 22.412803532 89% => OK
Preposition: 50.0 30.3222958057 165% => OK
Nominalization: 3.0 5.01324503311 60% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1740.0 1373.03311258 127% => OK
No of words: 355.0 270.72406181 131% => OK
Chars per words: 4.9014084507 5.08290768461 96% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.34067318298 4.04702891845 107% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.56805640662 2.5805825403 100% => OK
Unique words: 192.0 145.348785872 132% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.540845070423 0.540411800872 100% => OK
syllable_count: 536.4 419.366225166 128% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.55342163355 97% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 3.25607064018 61% => OK
Article: 7.0 8.23620309051 85% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.51434878587 66% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 2.5761589404 155% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 15.0 13.0662251656 115% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 21.2450331126 108% => OK
Sentence length SD: 55.0399450904 49.2860985944 112% => OK
Chars per sentence: 116.0 110.228320801 105% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.6666666667 21.698381199 109% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.0 7.06452816374 71% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.09492273731 122% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 4.19205298013 24% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 4.33554083885 92% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 4.45695364238 179% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.27373068433 70% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.15832601254 0.272083759551 58% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0567456620325 0.0996497079465 57% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0351466977423 0.0662205650399 53% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0858128270035 0.162205337803 53% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0385657861075 0.0443174109184 87% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.5 13.3589403974 101% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 56.59 53.8541721854 105% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 5.55761589404 158% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 11.0289183223 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.44 12.2367328918 93% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.65 8.42419426049 103% => OK
difficult_words: 87.0 63.6247240618 137% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 10.7273730684 103% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 10.498013245 107% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.2008830022 98% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Write the essay in 20 minutes.
Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.