| Complete credited cast: | |||
| Ruth Warrick | ... |
Sally
|
|
| Bobby Driscoll | ... | ||
|
|
James Baskett | ... | |
|
|
Luana Patten | ... | |
|
|
Lucile Watson | ... |
Grandmother
|
| Hattie McDaniel | ... |
Aunt Tempy
|
|
|
|
Erik Rolf | ... |
John
(as Eric Rolf)
|
|
|
Glenn Leedy | ... |
Toby
|
|
|
Mary Field | ... |
Mrs. Favers
|
|
|
Anita Brown | ... |
Maid
|
|
|
Georgie Nokes | ... |
Jake Favers
(as George Nokes)
|
|
|
Gene Holland | ... |
Joe Favers
|
|
|
Nick Stewart | ... |
Br'er Bear
(voice) (as Nicodemus Stewart)
|
|
|
Johnny Lee | ... |
Br'er Rabbit
(voice)
|
Uncle Remus draws upon his tales of Brer Rabbit to help little Johnny deal his confusion over his parents' separation as well as his new life on the plantation. The tales: The Briar Patch, The Tar Baby and Brer Rabbit's Laughing place. Written by Paul Penna <tterrace@wco.com>
When the marriage of his parents goes through a crisis, Johnny (Bobby Driscoll) moves with his mom to the Southern mansion of his grandmother. Distraught over the absence of his father, he strikes up a friendship with Uncle Remus (James Baskett), an old black man who tells him stories of rabbits, foxes and bears.
Driscoll is obnoxiously cute, but James Baskett delivers a fine performance as Remus and the animated sections with Br'er Rabbit are fun.
But is it racist? Well, it has no overt depictions of racism and therein lies the problem: Song of the South presents life in the Southern states after the civil war as idyllic and harmonious, a place where white people live in their mansions, black people in their cabins, everybody knows their place and is happy in it. "Yes sir, things are lookin' mighty satisfactual" says Uncle Remus and his Br'er Rabbit stories convey the same social conservatism: leaving your home (to a non-segregated North for instance) is pointless because "You can't run away from trouble. There ain't no place that far." This movie can't imagine a single reason why a black man living in the post-slavery South wouldn't be happy with the way things were.
Yet, these are the gripes of an adult and Song of the South is a children's film. With our modern-day knowledge of American history, it's obvious that the film is far removed from harsh reality, but can you really blame a kiddie-movie for presenting a fantasy-world? It is a musical with animated sequences, does it make sense to demand or expect realism? The stories and songs, however sanitized and Disney-fied they may be, are based on Afro-American folk-tales and music, which means that the movie at least acknowledges the existence of an Afro-American culture. That's actually an improvement over Gone With the Wind.
Song of the South certainly has its faults, but I find Disney's self-censorship misplaced: at its simplest, most basic level, this is a movie about a white kid befriending a black man who is portrayed as intelligent, compassionate and kind. How harmful could that be?