An honest attempt to deal with the pop culture of the past or to cancel the uncontrolled culture? This is the debate that has been going on across America for the past year, as films like Gone with the Wind and tropical Thunder and TV shows, including The Dukes of Hazzard and The Simpsons were reexamined for problematic representations of race, gender and class. Even basic childhood items like the Muppets and Dr. Seuss were placed under the microscope: Disney + recently placed content warning labels on selected episodes of The Muppet Show, after doing the same for animated films like Dumbo and Peter Pan.
Meanwhile, Dr. Seuss Enterprises – who oversees Theodor Geisel’s assets – announced that it would stop publishing six of the late author’s books, including If I ran the zoo and The Cat’s Quizzer. Both movements infuriated conservative critics, even though others endorsed the company’s attempts to struggle with their respective stories.
Turner Classic Moves is taking its own approach to the debate. On March 4, Hollywood’s first vintage cable network will unveil its newest series, Reframed: Classic Films in the Rear View Mirror. The month-long program will feature classic movie lineups preceded by a round table anchored by the five TCM presenters: Ben Mankiewicz, Dave Karger, Alicia Malone, Eddie Muller and Jacqueline Stewart. Your conversations about the “rear view mirror” will begin with Gone with the Wind, followed by seventeen additional titles ranging from Guess who’s coming to dinner and Breakfast at Tiffany’s for The researchers and Psycho.
In discussing these various films, the hosts intend to highlight the various aspects that are currently out of step, at the same time that they place the film itself in the proper historical context and celebrate the elements that endure. In this way, the presenters hope to clarify why it is okay to have an honest discussion about our pop culture background and to make up for any accusations that they are “canceling” these films. “In that Reframed series, we are literally showing the films, “Mankiewicz told Yahoo Entertainment.” It is difficult to argue that we are canceling them. This is what we do: the national conversation we are having, we embrace it and are grateful for it. We want these films that we love and care for to be part of that conversation. They can help in many ways. “
Mankiewicz has a personal interest in wanting to reexamine classic food: the 53-year-old film historian is part of a Hollywood dynasty that dates back to the Golden Age of the industry. That was when his grandfather, Herman J. Mankiewicz – the subject of Oscar nominee David Fincher, Mank – classics written as Citizen Kane, while his great uncle, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, wrote, directed and produced perennial favorites such as All about Eva and Woman of the Year. The last film, which featured the first pair of Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, is included in the Reframed series, and her descendant managed to watch it with new eyes. “He personally introduced Hepburn and Tracy, and that triggered the quarter-century love affair they had,” says young Mankiewicz. “They made nine films together, and this is one of the best. They are wonderful together.”
The end of the film, on the other hand, is not so wonderful. For much of Woman of the Year, Hepburn’s ambitious journalist puts her career first, creating tension with her new husband, played by Tracy. But in the last act, she reverses the course and makes a desperate attempt to save her marriage, leading to a comical climax that Time the magazine’s critic, Stephanie Zacharek, described it as a “lack of courage”.
Mankiewicz would agree with this assessment of his great-uncle’s production. “Throughout the film, you see the significant struggles of a successful woman in public life,” he explains. “But then this stupid ending is put into practice, because there was a strong feeling at MGM that we had better put that ending here so that nobody would think that Hepburn’s character is too arrogant. Spencer Tracy than having independence. There is no value to us no showing this, but there is tremendous value in seeing and learning from it. “
And that attitude is indicative of TCM’s broader approach to its extensive catalog of Hollywood classics. Mankiewicz suggests that the network will not add content labels similar to Disney’s or follow the example of Seuss’s property and remove specific films from the radio waves – although he also refuses to criticize these companies for doing so. “These decisions, ultimately, are not mine,” he notes. “But that’s not what we do at TCM: we put things in context and we curate, so we’ll continue to curate. When we launched the network, we assumed this role of being the administrators of the classic Hollywood. I’m not a programmer, but I don’t I’m sure the initial warnings would do enough anyway. We can get to the point where people get over it in the same way that they get over the FBI’s piracy notice. It’s important to have someone you trust to tell you the story of it. in an attractive and engaging way. Reframed it is an opportunity for people to see what we do and the value of what we do. “
One of the arguments often made by those who advocate the “culture cancellation” argument is that none of the offenses identified in older films and TV shows were problematic at the time. But the Reframed talk around Gone with the Wind backs off against that view, signaling how the film’s depictions of black men and women in the Southern Civil War era were criticized even before a painting was shot. “In 1937, the NAACP expressed its concern about adapting Margaret Mitchell’s book to a major film,” said Mankiewicz. “They knew very clearly what that would mean. So the conversation around racism in Gone with the Wind is 84 years old and I think this is significant for all of us to realize. “
“The phrase ‘cancel culture’ ends up distorting the story and minimizing the importance of what we are talking about”, continues the presenter. “It is a phrase that serves a political purpose, but not an artistic end or a meaningful understanding of what we are talking about. I am delighted to have interesting and interesting conversations about popular art forms that – through their absolute power – uneven playing field. You don’t have to respect these conversations, but they will make us better and stronger as a country. I don’t know why anyone on Earth would be afraid of that. “
Reframed: Classic Films in the Rear View Mirror airs on Thursdays at 8 pm at TCM.
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