Roses de sang

Those of you, like me, who think Randolph Scott should have been cast in Gone With the Wind, need to check out So Red the Rose. It's so similar to Margaret Mitchell's work, it's a wonder someone didn't sue for plagiarism. Margaret Sullavan plays the flirty Southern belle without substance. She has a huge crush on classy, upstanding Randolph Scott. Her father, Walter Connolly, is larger than life and prizes their land and plantation. When the Civil War starts, she learns about life and survival, what's really important, and who she really loves. Sound familiar?

No, this movie isn't in Technicolor, there's no tearjerker theme, and the running time is half that of the famous epic, but it's still very similar. I'm not a Margaret Sullavan fan, but she's just fine in this role. Randolph Scott is, of course, perfect. Walter Connolly, a highly underrated actor with too brief a career, added to the believability of the film. If you love Gone With the Wind, I really wouldn't recommend renting this version. It won't change your mind, since it's obviously a lesser quality movie. But if you always feel frustrated every time you hear Clark Gable speak without a Southern accent, this movie will help vindicate you.

Like so many of the Hollywood films of the era, this film presents a ridiculous and offensive view of the old South. In pre-Civil War southern states, the slaves are all shown as being very happy, well taken care of and in love with their masters. Whippings, forced sales of which broke up families and dehumanization are no where in sight in these movies...and because of that the films, no matter how good they are otherwise, are basically dishonest.

In "So Red the Rose", the black slaves (especially the house slaves) are super-loyal and decent and it's only the wicked field hands that become 'uppity' towards the end of the Civil War. The message seems to be that without the war, everything would have just been fine!

As far as the story goes, it's all about a rich antebellum family, the Bedfords. While the womenfolk stay home, the men are out giving their all for the South. It's all told in a highly sympathetic and melodramatic fashion...with lots of sweet music, tenderness and style. And, when the war is over the blacks are no longer slaves and are rebellious and ungrateful for the wonderful treatment they'd received from their owners!!

The bottom line is that this film is very slickly made and well acted...and complete crap! I do not understand how so many reviewers loved the film and didn't seem to notice that it was also a complete lie. Strange.

I saw this film on television (channel 21 I believe) back in the 1980s. It was okay, and (given the standards of racial stereotypes in 1935)actually ahead of its time in one scene. Otherwise, it is a pale sketch for Gone With The Wind. I think the reason is that whatever failings on racial grounds haunt us regarding Margaret Mitchell's novel, Miss Mitchell created memorable characters in Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler (and yes, even in Mammy)while the screenplay writers and the novelist who wrote SO RED THE ROSE did not do so. Also, the disasters facing Margaret Sullivan's world (while ruinous) are not as visually nightmarish to us as Scarlet's finding her father insane and her mother dead, or of seeing Atlanta burn. There are moments in SO RED that subtly show the size of the disaster - the death of the weakened defeated Walter Conolly, as he returns home in his carriage, for example. But while sad, it just does not hold a candle to the collapse of the ante-bellum Atlanta in GWTW.

The one moment that does stand out (and stands out against the normal racist rubbish of the 1930s) was when Sullivan confronts her slaves, who have heard the Yankee troops are approaching and they may be free. She tries to control them with reminders of how good her family was to them (although - tellingly - she slaps one who dare suggests its wasn't all that great). But further bad news reaches her, and she collapses. The slaves look at her - and walk away to desert the plantation. No scene like that is in GWTW, but I suspect it happened far more frequently than Margaret Mitchell would have preferred to have know of.

Interesting seeing the 25 year old Robert Cummings acting alongside Randolph Scott. I didn't believe his Southern accent, but he demonstrated that he could ride a horse. I don't think Westerns are his forte. Scott, however, put in a good performance. It really does depend on who is directing him which determines what performance you get. Sometimes he's wooden and bland. Other times he can be dark and deep. His best performances is when he is an antagonist or displaying a bit of menace. Margaret Sullavan may have been popular in the 30s and good friends with James Stewart, but she doesn't stand the test of time like Maureen O'Sullivan. She doesn't add much to this film, and the film itself is a bit weak. However, it does give a voice and screen-time to African- American characters and actors.

"So Red The Rose" is a forerunner of "Gone With The Wind" and there are several similarities apart from the Civil War backdrop. 'Rose' is in black and white and does not have the sweep or scope of the later picture. It is somewhat stagebound and takes place entirely on the Bedford plantation belonging to Margaret Sullavan's father, played by Walter Connolly. It is a story of the ante-bellum South which becomes the post-bellum South before the picture is over, and of one family in particular and how they manage the transition.

Like GWTW there is precious little action - one would expect a Civil War picture to have some second unit action, but no. The most we get are a few loud arguments, mostly from Miss Sullavan who is the pivotal figure in the film as Vivien Leigh was in hers. It is mainly a character study with a good, solid story to go with it. There is a sequence in which the slaves of the Bedford's realize they are free, but can't figure out what to do about it. I found it fascinating and gives one pause as to what it must have been like to suddenly find yourself a free man after a lifetime of slavery. This is the type of situation that a master director like King Vidor can bring off - a completely human instance tailor-made for him and which he illustrated in "The Crowd"(1928).

This is a good movie and a good story. I thought it had some touches that GWTW did not - what it doesn't have is length (at only 80 minutes), scope and a PR campaign behind it like the more famous film. But it is well worth seeing in its own right.