BEFORE: Perhaps you could tell this was what I've been building up to this week. The fact that "C.S.A" name-checked this film was not planned, it's just another bit of coincidence. With an almost four-hour run time, this is the longest film to win the Best Picture Oscar - so I'm splitting this one over a Friday AND a Saturday. I've also got some long Westerns coming up, so I'll be doing a bit of this in the days to come.
Given that this is one of the most popular films of all time, and that it generally appears on most "Best of" lists - how does this happen? How does a guy get to be 39 (OK, 44) years old, work in the film industry (sort of) and never get around to watching this film? Hmm, maybe that 4 hour-run time has kept me from tackling it. Well, that's about to change.
Damn, I don't even know what the title means - all I really know is that, frankly, Rhett Butler doesn't give a damn, and I don't know what he doesn't give a damn about!
THE PLOT: A manipulative Southern belle carries on a turbulent affair with a blockade runner during the American Civil War.
AFTER: Well, whatever else, this film looks gorgeous. I watched a 70th Anniversary DVD release that I bought a few months ago in a video store (yes, they still exist) on Long Island - a little research tells me that a restored version was made in 2004 from original Technicolor negatives, which were scanned at high-resolution and then color-timed to be identical to a surviving answer print to make a new digital master. The resulting colors are just phenomenal, so I pity anyone who watched this film prior to this release, because it was probably all washed-out or muddy.
Oh, right, the plot. I think the title refers to the Southern way of life prior to the Civil War, a way of life that was "Gone With the Wind" afterwards. You know, I never really even thought about the title's meaning until today. The Southern society seems idyllic, what with all the parties and cotillions and balls and such - the film opens on the day of one such event, a barbecue party at a plantation.
This is where we first see Scarlett O'Hara in action - and every man is at her beck and call, and she strings them all along, even though she has feelings just for Ashley Wilkes, and devastated by the news that he's engaged to his cousin, Melanie Hamilton. (Yep, it's the South, people marry their cousins - deal with it.) Even though she's genuinely upset, she still finds the time in the middle of the party to lay down for a nap with all the other women - this seems like a rather odd thing to do in the middle of a party, but again, it's the South, it was probably very hot in the middle of the day, and this was their version of a siesta - napping while fanned by black slave children. Yep.
A stranger in town is at the party, and he overhears Scarlett confess her love to Ashley - Rhett Butler's his name, and he'll be more important later on. Wouldn't you know, right in the middle of the party the Civil War breaks out, and all the men ride off to enlist in the Confederate Army while their wives and girlfriends are napping, so most of them never got to say goodbye.
The film really seems to be about Scarlett's personal growth (or lack thereof) with the war as a backdrop - she marries one soldier whom she doesn't love (Melanie's younger brother, Charles), because that'll show that darn Ashley, and before you know it, she's a widow. She moves to Atlanta looks after her frenemy Melanie while Ashley is fighting the war, and Rhett Butler keeps popping back into her life to alternately help and torment her.
Melanie gives birth - and Scarlett tries in vain to get a doctor to come help, even though the doctor's sort of busy treating thousands of wounded soldiers. This is where Scarlett continues to seem clueless and selfish, but eventually she grows up (a little) and becomes somewhat self-sufficient. When Atlanta is under siege, she returns home to the Tara plantation (Rhett drives her most of the way there, what an almost-gentleman) and finds it in ruin. She digs up a dirty radish from the ground, and is disgusted by it (umm, we usually wash the vegetables first) and vows to "never go hungry again". End of Disc I.
Act II is basically the story of Southern reconstruction, as symbolized by Scarlett's maturity and eventual economic good fortune. She did vow (after eating the dirty radish) to do whatever it took to keep her family going - lie, cheat, steal, whatever - so that's exactly what she does. Killing a thieving Union soldier who breaks into her home yields a few gold coins, and marrying another man she doesn't love provides the rest. Frank Kennedy, who owns a successful hardware store and lumber business, had wanted to marry Scarlett's younger sister, but she steps in and marries him herself when she realizes that all of Atlanta's going to need to rebuild with his lumber. She also cries in order to get Ashley involved in the lumber business, so that's really mature...poor guy wants to move to New York and work in a bank, but anything to keep a woman from crying.
There's more drama as Scarlett gets attacked while driving a buggy herself through a post-war Shantytown, and her husband rounds up a bunch of men to seek revenge - that doesn't end well either. After the death of husband #2, Rhett Butler steps in as husband #3 - they have a lavish honeymoon in New Orleans, Scarlett gives birth to a daughter, and life seems idyllic again.
Ah ah, not so fast. Remember, this is the 1800's, and life expectancy wasn't so great back then. More people start dropping like flies, and I won't give away any more of the plot, but suffice it to say that Scarlett finally figures out that Ashley's NEVER going to love her back, so she should just love the one she's with - only she figures this out too late. Rhett realizes she's never going to get over Ashley, so he bails - leading to the famous line where he just doesn't give a damn about what happens to Scarlett in the future. Scarlett vows to someday get him back, because after all, tomorrow is another day. And...scene.
There, it's accomplished. But what does it all mean? It looks fantastic, as I said before, with giant sweeping vistas of Southern plantations, and thousands of wounded soldiers splayed out on the Atlanta streets. But what's the message - the Civil War sucked? Got it. Some spoiled little rich girls had to grow up really fast during the war? Hmm, getting closer. Don't spend so much time pining over your lost love that you neglect the one who really loves you back? I guess that's it...
Starring Vivien Leigh (last seen in "A Streetcar Named Desire"), Clark Gable (last seen in "Mutiny on the Bounty"), Olivia de Havilland (last seen in "Captain Blood"), Leslie Howard, Thomas Mitchell, Ann Rutherford, Hattie McDaniel, Butterfly McQueen, Harry Davenport, with cameos from George Reeves, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson and a cast of thousands...
RATING: 6 out of 10 "Fiddle-dee-dee"s
Before watching this film, I also only knew the line "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn" which I believed was a big deal because of the use of profanity at the time. And I had no idea what the title was referring to either.
ReplyDeleteStrangely I too had never seen this film before, and did not plan on doing so until I had read the book. I just got finished with the audiobook, and then went on to the film.
Oddly enough, with such a long film, it felt very rushed compared to the book. Some of the underlying reasons for the actions that took place were left out. It seemed like Scarlet was not particularly interested in Ashley until she found out he was going to be married, then she began an obsession with him. BTW, I don't know if this was mentioned in the film, but Scarlet was only 16 when this look place, along with her first marriage.
I am trying to recall now if I actually recognized George Reeves when I watched this film.
I think George Reeves played one of those "twin" brothers who are talking to Scarlett in the first scene. It seems like pretty much everybody who was anybody in Hollywood at the time made an appearance in this film - several people who played wounded soldiers went on to become semi-famous actors, there were too many for me to mention.
ReplyDeleteI heard something similar from a co-worker, that I really need to read the book, which was more complete than the film and did a better job of getting into each character's motivation. However, I don't have that kind of time. I barely had time to watch the four-hour movie. And my reading time is still devoted to "Clone Wars" novels, and I'm way behind. (Just finished "Order 66", which I found very interesting. I had assumed that the clones just killed the Jedi mindlessly because they were programmed to, and this book suggests otherwise.)
I don't know if I'd consider the action "rushed" in "Gone With the Wind". I suppose if it's covering a 10-year time period (20?) in four hours, that's sort of an inevitable result. I was hoping Scarlett would have matured more over the passage of time, but I'm not really sure that she did.