Thread by @rudepundit

Huh. My pal @Creterman just showed me that he has a DVD bootleg of Disney's Song of the South. So we're gonna watch it. We haven't seen it since we were kids. I wonder how it's aged. Let's see...

And away we go.

With cinematography by Gregg Toland, who also did Citizen Kane.

We're headed to the plantation with Hattie McDaniel and some white people she wants to kill.

It takes place after the Civil War, but I don't think all the Black people would be quite so happy.

White child is confused by the existence of a Black child.

Apparently, all the Black people just hang around singing songs about Uncle Remus in perfect harmony. The white boy is wandering around and wondering what the fuck is this Black strangeness.

First appearance of Uncle Remus and he's telling stories and, holy shit, his skin has been blackened by makeup. So this is a minstrel show.

Uncle Remus finds White Johnny and brings him back to his cabin to tell him stories of Brer Rabbit, "duh mos' bodacious critter in duh whole world."

We are zip-a-dee-do-da-ing and it’s worse than you remember:

So the cartoon characters are all based on Black caricatures, like Jim Crow and Zip Coon. If you ever don't understand how fucked our racial history is, watch this shit.

Believe it or not, it took 6 white men to write this, based on the works of another white man.

Hattie McDaniel had won a fuckin' Oscar in 1939 and was still playing the Mamie seven years later. Just a goddamn tragedy.

Johnny is visited in the morning by his Black friend. White mom comes into the bedroom, kisses Johnny, and doesn't even say a word to the Black child. Johnny will grow up to join the Klan, obviously.

Toby, the Black child, makes Buckwheat look and sound like a goddamn Rhodes scholar.

Even more white children threaten to murder a puppy, chase Toby away, and mock Johnny for wearing a lace collar. We're seeing a serial killer origin story here.

Johnny meets a little white girl and giver her his lace collar. They fall in love and go on a rowboat ride because no one gave a shit if children drowned back then.

Uncle Remus just keeps singing and smiling, no matter what labor he has to do, and giving comfort to sad white Johnny, who obviously is suffering far more in the plantation house than Uncle Remus in his shack.

All the black people are heading off to pick cotton and plow the fields, singing about how awesome that is.

Jesus, the little white girl sounds like a fucking gremlin.

Oh, we're heading back to cartoon land, with Uncle Remus going fishing and sharing a bowl with a frog, obviously getting high as fuck.

All the Br'er creatures are voiced by Black actors. So in order to get work and a paycheck, this is the kind of shit they had to do.

Br'er Fox and Br'er Bear are just shuckin' and jivin' around Br'er Rabbit when he's stuck in the tar baby.

Br'er Fox threatening to lynch Br'er Rabbit is quite something.

James Baskett, who was also the voice of one of the crows in Dumbo, was 42 when he played Uncle Remus.

Two white boys who wanted to murder the puppy get beaten by their mother, assuring that they become cross-burning psychopaths in the future.

Uncle Remus just learned that white Johnny lied to him about the goddamn puppy, but instead of being mad at Johnny, he just laughs it off while Johnny's white mom tries to break off the Remus/Johnny relationship, the only true love in this movie.

"Without Uncle Remus and his stories, the child would be utterly desolate," says white grandma. Because he needs a Magical Negro to complete his identity.

Uncle Remus gives away the puppy and tells Johnny he's not going to tell him any more stories. Johnny weeps, but somehow gets it together for his birthday party.

Psychopath white boys push their gremlin sister in the mud and Johnny goes apeshit attacking them. One of them raises a branch to flat out murder Johnny, stopped in the nick of time by Uncle Remus, who must wonder why he doesn't just let them all kill each other.

Instead, Uncle Remus tells one more Br'er story, which involves Fox and Bear ready to cook and eat Rabbit. At one point, Rabbit has a noose around his neck. They are not subtle.

By the way, Joel Chandler Harris, creator of Uncle Remus, believed that Uncle Tom's Cabin was "a wonderful defense of slavery."

White mom chastises Uncle Remus for spending time with her white child because she wants to make sure he hates himself. Meanwhile, all the still-singing Black people come back from their time picking cotton.

I wanna see a version where Uncle Remus locks every white person in the plantation house and burns it down, shooting anyone who tries to exit, laughing and singing the whole time.

Remus Unchained.

Uncle Remus leaves to go to Atlanta and Johnny has no idea how to live without his Magical Negro. He runs into a field with a crazed bull that wants to have sex with Johnny. The bull mounts Johnny and...

Oh, wait. Got that wrong. The bull just tramples or butts Johnny. Mom picks up Johnny's broken body and brings him to the plantation home, where all the Black people sing outside to use their Magical Negro healing powers.

Johnny is calling out for his only true love, Uncle Remus. All the white adults are distressed, so Grandma, who is clearly Uncle Remus's lover, calls him in to tell another goddamn story. Negro Magic to the rescue of white people!

Uncle Remus's Magical Negro Storytelling has brought all the white people together and made everyone happy. Of course, they aren't going to give him money or a decent home, but the approval of white people is enough.

Now the animated characters appear in the real world as all laws of physics and nature collapse and madness reigns.

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah

By the way, Bobby Driscoll, who played Johnny, died horrible and depressingly. Look it up.

Welp, should have left that in my childhood. Thanks, grandma, for offering me no context for this when you took me to see it.

It shouldn't need to be said, but, yeah, it's really fucking racist.