Gone with the Wind (1939)

Directed by Victor Fleming. Starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Leslie Howard, Olivia de Havilland, Hattie McDaniel, Thomas Mitchell, Rand Brooks, Butterfly McQueen, Laura Hope Crews, Barbara O’Neil, George Reeves, Fred Crane, Evelyn Keyes, Ann Rutherford, Victor Jory, Harry Davenport, Everett Brown. [G]

The most famous film that Hollywood has ever produced is, of course, enormously problematic (as the opening text crawl laments of its “chivalrous” antebellum South spectacle: “Here in this pretty world Gallantry took its last bow; here was the last ever to be seen of Knights and their Ladies Fair, of Master and of Slave”), but the chief reason why it fails is because it’s a four-hour soap opera based off the Margaret Mitchell novel, plagued by numerous wretchedly-written passages and a repugnantly spoiled and manipulative tramp as a protagonist, the as-insufferable-as-she-is-iconic Scarlett O’Hara. Oscar-winner Leigh plays the part about as well as it could be, but no effort is made to study her behavior and condemn it—she’s even give a few heroic moments!—and the filmmakers can’t seem to decide whether or not she’s deserving of redemption (Max Steiner’s score suggests that she does, at least), and she’s often blown off the screen when sharing scenes with sassy house slave Mammy (fellow Oscar-winner McDaniel) and rakish scoundrel Rhett Butler (Gable). The central plot thrust is a sound one, even if it’s unworthy of all the narrative excess (the pic turns histrionic and then downright boring after the intermission), but it hardly matters since the story is so often overwhelmed by all the surrounding pageantry, without an expense spared or a single whiff of judicious artistry; consider for a moment how magnificent the Technicolor sights are, yet how few images actually stick after just one or two viewings. Fleming gets credited as director (and he was hardly the only one to assume that role across its lengthy filming), but producer David O. Selznick is the captain of this ship who’s calling all the shots, which explains why the scope and grandeur so often triumph, while style and eloquence end up a near-total wash. The other six Academy Awards it won included Best Picture and several technical merits. Still the highest grossing film to date when adjusted for inflation. A TV-miniseries sequel, Scarlett, arrived fifty-five (!) years later.

47/100