WAY WAY WAY Overrated

Rating: 4/10 (2 June 2000)

This is nothing more than a four-hour soap opera focusing on the one character who couldn't be less likable if she tried. There seems to be an obsession among romance writers about the antebellum South; this movie (and the book that spawned it) was no exception.
The film itself would be just another Hollywood big-production weepie except for the treatment of African American characters. Any who didn't kiss the Massa's rear end are portrayed as evil and dangerous (coveting Miss Scarlett and other Flowers of Southern Womanhood, naturally), and the others are portrayed as child-like and nearly helpless, with the exception of Mammy (Hattie McDaniel). Here's a fun fact -- Klansmen are shown as good guys here! It all adds up to one word: repulsive. Yeah, I know it was made in 1939. Guess what -- it's 2000 now. We should be embarrassed by this flick,not celebrating it, just like Birth of a Nation (1915).
I remember when Roots was on TV in 1976 and the Klan protested and asked for equal time. This movie would provide it.