Savannah: the Gothic City (Part Four)

             Robert De Niro in Cape Fear

t is not only writers but other art forms that would be influenced by the culture and climate of Savannah. Augusta Oelschig, a Savannah artist,  lived from 1918-2000 and Flannery lived from 1925 -1964. Oelschig was called a Southern gothic painter. Oelschig would travel and live in New York and travel to see and learn from the muralists of Mexico before she returns to Savannah. Oelschig was only eight years Flannery’s senior. Art Historians say her penchant to paint scenes of injustice and the lives of southern blacks was influenced by the Mexican muralists but I have an idea the Southern Gothic bug had hold of her too. We see this in her paintings of old abandoned Carousels. The once glorious carousels are now decaying and but a memory of what they once were. She did her series of carousels it is said while grieving for her brother after his death. A review of a career-spanning exhibition of Oelschig’s work that opened just weeks after the artist’s death described her aesthetic as having “a distinctive style that is both steeped in the Southern Gothic tradition and remarkably unique.” 
 Robert Taylor Arms one of the great printmakers of the early 20th century went all through Europe making meticulously detailed prints of Gothic cathedrals and buildings calling Gothic architecture the pinnacle of Humanity’s creative mind.  In 1933 he came to the Telfair Academy to teach printmaking. John Taylor Arms in his brief sojourn here continued to communicate his love for all things Gothic in his year residency here in Savannah. 

In most list of the top ten southern gothic movies two were made here in Savannah. One features a novel written by Flannery and with native Savannahian Leopold Stratton making an appearance in it: Wiseblood . The other movie was Cape Fear original had Robert Mitchum, Gregory Peck, and Polly Bergen. The remake had Robert Deniro, Nick Nolte, Juliette Lewis, Jessica Lange. The film tells the story of how a convicted rapist who, using his newfound knowledge of the law and its numerous loopholes, seeks vengeance against a former public defender whom he blames for his 14-year imprisonment. He felt unfair courtroom tactics were used.  Many of the outdoor scenes were filmed on location in Savannah. The indoor scenes were done at Universal Studios Soundstage. Mitchum had a real-life aversion to Savannah, where as a teenager, he had been charged with vagrancy and put on a chain gang.

But probably many people's favorite movie with Savannah as the setting is Forrest Gump made in 1994. Director Robert Zemekis said about the South: "There is something about the Gothic South that we depict in the movie. In a strange way, it's sort of the most patriotic part of America in the way it is slow to change. The South was always in the script. It's where these characters came from. The one constant that we had in the movie is that the characters kept coming home (to the South). It (the South) is that one place that seems to never change, when the rest of the world does."
The Savannah scene is central to the movie. The protagonist Forrest Gump, who is a mentally challenged innocent, reveals that he is waiting at the bus stop bench to anyone who will listen because he received a letter from Jenny his childhood sweetheart. Despite their divergent paths in life he has never lost the fire of his love for her. His famous quote ‘Life is like a box of chocolates’ originates here. Jenny is now living in Savannah and had seen him on TV during his run across America and invited him to visit. Jenny reveals Forrest to be the father of her child, also named Forrest, and that she is suffering from an unknown virus (presumably HIV/AIDS). Jenny proposes to Forrest, and he accepts. Forrest and Jenny return to Greenbow with Forrest Jr and are finally married. Jenny eventually dies of her illness and Forrest becomes a devoted father to Forrest Jr. Later, Gump is waiting with his son for the school bus to pick him up for his first day of school. As the bus departs, the feather from the beginning of the film floats off into the air. 
This film evokes the emotions and themes of Southern Gothic and it seems only natural that it centers on him in one of our historic squares. Today the bench is in our history museum and some tour buses are lucky enough to encounter an actor who portrays Forrest with a brief case in hand.

Of course Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil is yet another example of a movie that accentuates some of the themes of Southern Gothic. Savannah's own Lady Chablis plays herself and Clint Eastwood directs. These are but a few of the movies made in Savannah but they are the more obvious shows with a gothic feel. Next blog we will finish the series on Savannah: The Gothic City.
 

---

​

---

Forest Gump on Bench in Savannah

August Oelschig Paintings

---