HBO Max has temporarily removed “Gone With the Wind” from its streaming library in order to add historical context to the 1939 film long criticized for romanticizing slavery and the Civil War-era South.
In a statement, the AT&T-owned WarnerMedia, which owns HBO Max, called “Gone With the Wind” “a product of its time” that depicts racial prejudices.
The company said that when “Gone With the Wind” returns to the recently launched streaming service, it will include “historical context and a denouncement of those very depictions, but will be presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed.”
Based on a 1936 book by Margaret Mitchell, “Gone With the Wind” is a historical epic about a romance between Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh), the daughter of a Georgia plantation owner, and Rhett Butler (Clark Gable), a gambler who joins the Confederacy.
The move by WarnerMedia prompted widespread debate on social media Wednesday, especially among those who didn’t realize HBO Max planned to return “Gone With the Wind” to it platform.
