Band of Angels
On Wednesday, September 28th, 2022, my Talking About Freedom class had another movie day. We had completed our mock trial and our EOTO presentation on that Monday before. And to celebrate a job well done, our professor brought us to the Extraordinaire Theatre to watch the movie "Band of Angels".
What I noticed about race relations in the movie was that black people were treated as property. It did a great job of depicting how black people were treated in the south. We were shown slaves being sold and how they were required to stand in different areas on boats away from white people. We also saw how Yvonne De Carlo's character, Amantha Starr, was treated. Even though she was still part white, she was still discriminated against for being partly black. We were also told Clark Gable's character, Hamish Bonds, past of being a slave trader. How he had worked with people who would seek out villages to take people in to be sold as slaves. It had helped me realize how things were in the south from the perspective of the characters. I had seen how people were treated based upon race.
New Orleans had been an international gateway into America. There were many different types of people who lived there. This means that many black people lived here, either willingly or unwillingly. Some as slaves and some as freed people. And the fact that European nations had already outlawed slavery by 1860, definitely affected the United States' feelings on whether slavery should continue.
In the film, the idea of "freedom" was brought up often. Each character had their own definition and reasons for wanting freedom. For example, Amantha Starr wanted freedom from half of herself. She didn't want to be labeled at all as black. Due to her being partly black, she was taken from her home and sold into slavery, she didn't want that. She wanted to live a "white life". Hamish Bond wanted freedom from his past. He had made mistakes that he wanted to repent for. Lastly, Sidney Poitier's character, Rau-Ru, wanted freedom from Hamish. Since his childhood, he had relied on him because he saved his life. He no longer wanted to protect him and feel as if he owed him something. In the end, all three characters never accomplished that freedom. Amantha learned that she didn't need to escape from part of herself, Hamish learned that his past was now a part of him and all he could do was move forward, and Rau-Ru helped Hamish in the end as he relearned that Hamish was like his family.
Compared to Gone with the Wind, I think I prefer this film. I like it because the movie focused a bit more on the perspective of black people during the time. This is good because the discussion of enslaved black people was the focus during the time. We got to see that perspective and learned more about the impacts. Band of Angels discussed the depiction of race in the south a bit better than Gone with the Wind did, as we saw not only the perspective of Rau-Ru, but the lead character Amantha was depicted as partly black. The black characters had more of a character and development in the end. They weren't just there as support for the white characters. Freedom for each character was also depicted. That was a good route to go on the filmmaker's part. By doing so in that perspective, we learned more about the characters and their feelings.
To finish, the film was great. The depiction of the time seemed more accurate than Gone with the Wind, which is a factor that I liked. And character building throughout the film was visible; you could definitely see each of their developments which was great.
Work Cited:
Band of Angels (Film: 1957)
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