There are several instances in both films where it seems the south is being romanticized—especially in Gone with the Wind. While these moments are a bit simpler to point out, it is useful to look at the ways in which the films offer a portrait of Southerners that is not at all flattering. While some films that idealize the struggle of Southern men during and around the time of the Civil War (such as Birth of a Nation andShenandoah) both Gone with the Wind and Cold Mountain offer male “heroes” of the South that are not typical nor traditionally heroic. Rhett Butler is not represented as a man that is interested in the war beyond his own profits. He is an admitted stockade-runner and does not fit into the stereotypical “fighter” old often imposed upon Southern men in film and literature. “Clearly, this is not a man [Rhett Butler] who will blindly and unerringly support the Cause. In fact, as he later cheerfully admits to Scarlett at the party in Atlanta, he will gladly profit from that Cause’s defeat” (Railton 2003). Even though Gone with the Windrepeatedly presents an idealized portrait of the South, it breaks the mold by showing a man that is not interested in defeating the Yanks.
Of Cold Mountain, one critic calls the war, in terms of the film “devoid of meaning” because the male characters are not shown to have an active and essentially “male” interest in fighting for the Southern cause. “There is almost no indication of the issues behind the struggle or why those from Cold Mountainchoose to fight for the Confederacy. A scene in which a church service has begun leads to much excitement on the part of boys and men eager to fight. It is very much like the scene at Twelve Oaks in Gone with the Wind where the same news is met with equal enthusiasm; but in that film, an earlier scene of Rhett Butler debating hot-headed young Georgians at least provides some meaning and context for their exuberant response” (Inscoe 2004). This perceived lack of interest on the part of the main male characters seems strange because in both films the threat to the desired way of Southern living is coming from outside of the South. For example, in Cold Mountain, all of the threats to life and the more peaceful rural way of life come directly from the North. The soldiers from the South are not depicted as being evil, but rather just as humans trying to survive in a senseless war. The Northern soldiers on the other hand are shown to be ruthless and murderous and the final message is that the North was, in many ways, more “cold” when it came to killing whereas the Southerners were just the innocents trying to defend a peaceful way of life. In Gone with the Wind, Scarlett battles against Northern deserters and is even forced to kill one. Even though it is assumed that the Northern soldiers have done their share of looting and murdering, the one time a Southerner defends herself, it is self-defense rather than a cruel act of war.
There are a number of elements in both ways that imply what is typically Southern. Gone with Wind is the best example for looking at these defining factors of Southern identity, especially before the Civil War since it depicts the idea of the Southern plantation life better than the odyssey presented in Cold Mountain. At Tara and Twelve Oaks, there is a sense of the grandiose plantation life depicted in romanticized paintings and literature depicting the old South. In many ways, Scarlett herself is the very picture of this Southern ideology since she does not have a care in the world other than men. This will of course be contrasted her plights just to survive later in the film, but some of the comments she makes before the reality of the war set in are telling about the careless attitudes among the well-to-do in the slaveholding South. For example, while surrounded by her any beaux as they discuss (in rather romantic terms) the war, Scarlett comments, “Fiddle-dee-dee. War, war, war; this war talk’s spoiling all the fun at every party this spring. I get so bored I could scream. Besides… there isn’t going to be any war.” This is important because it shows how out of touch with reality many wealthy Southerners were and how they thought their grand way of living would never end.
Women during this time before the Civil War had the luxury of being treated like children, objects to be pampered, objects who were never supposed to concern themselves with the tragedy of war. At one point, presumably during the Reconstruction era, Rhett tells Scarlett, “ It seems we’ve been at cross purposes, doesn’t it? But it’s no use now. As long as there was Bonnie, there was a chance that we might be happy. I liked to think that Bonnie was you, a little girl again, before the war, and poverty had done things to you. She was so like you, and I could pet her, and spoil her, as I wanted to spoil you. But when she went, she took everything.” This demonstrates how the Civil War and even early part of the Reconstruction periodshattered the notions that one could go through life with a childlike unawareness of world events. After the war, Scarlett is a much harder and resolute person. She has defended her territory and the “real world” of the War and its effects have caused her life to change drastically. Without question, Scarlett’s character is changed by the war more so than her male counterpart n Cold Mountain.
Although both Cold Mountain and Gone With the Wind have seen the grisly and unfortunate realities of war and its many tolls, Scarlett emerges as the most changed because she had to find that her world of parties, hats, and dresses was an illusion the whole time. That in reality, the opening credits which state, “There was a land of Cavaliers and Cotton Fields called the Old South before the Civil War… Here in this pretty world Gallantry took its last bow. Here was the last ever to be seen of Knights and their Ladies Fair, of Master and of Slave… Look for it only in books, for it is no more than a dream remembered. A Civilization gone with the wind…” is more true than anyone could ever have imagined. The other notable comment on this introductory message is that it clearly defines the “Old South” in a series of stark and unmistakably “Southern” images. The South, in terms of Gone with the Wind can be reduced to: “Knights and their Ladies Fair,” “Master and Slave,” and of course, “cotton fields.” By the end of the film it is proven that none of these things remain and it should also be pointed out that all of these things, some of them, especially “Master and Slave” have negative connotations in the real world yet are highly glossed and idealized from the very opening of the film (since the statements came from the title card).
