Capo
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Post by Capo on Jan 16, 2007 20:18:03 GMT
Gone With the Wind
Victor Fleming / George Cuckor / Sam Wood 1939 USA
A stubborn heroine lives through the American Civil War, driven by her three passions - two are men, the other her homeland.
Grandiose treatment of an important time in American history, balancing the brutalities of Civil War with a complicated love story which has its ups and downs, and certainly moments of delight. But on the whole, it is a tiresome, rather frivolous affair, all effort and little reward. It is a crafted film, not an artistic one, for which the producer, not the director(s), should get all the merit. Can production values alone save a film, though?
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Post by Robert C. on Feb 22, 2009 0:01:45 GMT
Despite my great interest in Civil War History; period pieces from Hollywood's Classic Age; and any Classic movie considered as "landmark" and culturally significant as this one; I had never seen this film...until this afternoon on TCM. And yeah, I definitely thought it was brilliant and one of the best stories ever (it is the ONLY novel by author Margaret Mitchell).. the hopeless romantic in me definitely held out naive hope of Scarlett and Ashley getting together until the very end (even though we know it ain't gonna happen) and I didn't feel the film dragged on at all but I found myself not wanting it to end. When the film goes to intermission with Scarlett's "I'll never starve again" scene, I was really hoping it wasn't the end of the movie despite the fact that I knew somewhere in the back of my mind that there was a really long intermission somewhere. I got an extra nice surprise b/c I had no idea that one of my newly discovered favorite actors from the age, Leslie Howard, co-stars in the role of Ashley Wilkes. I saw Howard in The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934), based on a recommendation of the novel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy. Howard was actually killed by the German Luftwaffe in 1943. Mostly likely the orders to liquidate Leslie came from Goebbels, who had been ridiculed in one of Howard's films and who believed Howard to be the most dangerous propagandist in the British service. Leslie Howard captures perfectly the sad faced, dreamer Ashley Wilkes. Wilkes, like Scarlett, laments the end of the Old South, but accepts it as such and is content to lament eternally for it, but in quiet. In contrast, Scarlett realizes in the film's finale that Tara is her true force of inspiration and she will continue to rebuild it. In the process, she will rebuild and keep alive her beloved Southern tradition, and THAT is how she will win back Rhett. Not b/c Rhett necessarily wants to see the Old South live on, but b/c her rebuilding the plantation is a metaphor for something greater in herself that's changing.  (There's much more to say on this film. Especially the film's somewhat controversial and unrealistic portrayal of the film's black characters, a topic covered extensively by TCM.) |
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Post by ronnierocketago on Feb 22, 2009 0:30:10 GMT
I didn't like GWTW. Maybe its that fucking movie further carried on that media tradition of portraying that conflict, and the region as a whole during that time, as from a southern belle plantation bullshit nonsense.
I mean why did all those southerners, especially the impoverished powerless ones, go to war? Surely since they didn't own slaves (mostly because they couldn't afford to), why would they give a fuck about fighting a war for the slavocracy that ran those southern state (and later Confederate) governments?
Besides, Scarlett was a spoiled bitch. That in itself isn't a bad thing if she was compelling...but she isn't, and quite frankly that honey got what she deserved from Gable's classic ending line.
An impressive production value epic in scale and ambition of course, but so was HEAVEN'S GATE, and I doubt anyone here especially in this thread is gonna say that HG was just as good as GWTW.
Whenever AFI did their last two Best Ever listings, their top ten was predictable in what you assume would/maybe deserve to make it, do....you know, CASABLANCA, CITIZEN KANE, LAWRENCE OF fucking ARABIA, THE GODFATHER, SINGING IN THE RAIN...and then GONE, which at this rate I think its a "classic" only by tradition, and not because each successive generation have equally come to the same conclusion.
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Post by svsg on Feb 22, 2009 0:31:56 GMT
Despite my great interest in Civil War History; period pieces from Hollywood's Classic Age; and any Classic movie considered as "landmark" and culturally significant as this one; I had never seen this film...until this afternoon on TCM. I haven't seen it either, but I never expected this from you  |
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Post by Robert C. on Feb 22, 2009 0:37:42 GMT
I know, I know! It was a real treat for me. Often times I try and wait to see a film in order to better savor it--kind of like how we always talk about wishing we could Godfather again for the first time--I waited years and years to see Pulp Fiction and am glad I did.
I probably wouldn't watch GWTW again but the love story reminds me very much of Wuthering Heights, a film (the "classic" version) I hope to review soon.
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Post by Robert C. on Feb 22, 2009 2:41:04 GMT
I think you all know that I watch a lot of the same type films and television shows as most of you guys do. And I'm telling you, this movie is a Mike Tyson-knock out Michael Jordan-slam dunk Mark McGwire-smash HIT. A bit dated at times, yes, but then are these cinematographic moments of sheer brilliance that make the film look about 60 years younger than it is. Did everyone notice how the screen outside the house went to black and white as Clark was leaving Scarlett for the final time? Brilllllllllllliaaaaant. One of the best scenes ever, of course. (GWTW was the first major film done in color along with The Wizard of Oz). Watch that again: www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZ7z6hpO57c&feature=relatedBTW: This film is VERY racy and very raunchy on many levels -- perhaps more than even most contemporary films. Sometimes disrespectful to blacks, yes. And the scene where Rhett carries Scarlett up the stairs to basically go bang her friggin brains out, or, "RAPE" her -- her red dress offset with the red stairs is, (deserving so) regarded as one of the better aesthetic moments ever: Gone with the Wind - Stairswww.youtube.com/watch?v=rljMJzLl8UYBut then the morning after she's (controversially) all smiles and songs:  The Morning After (Scarlett Sings)www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkCRW8bqNs0&feature=related |
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Post by Robert C. on Feb 22, 2009 3:57:09 GMT
.. the hopeless romantic in me definitely held out naive hope of Scarlett and Ashley getting together until the very end (even though we know it ain't gonna happen) Is that wrong of me? Were most of you automatically rooting for Clark Gable as Rhett? Again, I wasn't rooting for Ashley from a blond hair/blue eyed pro Old South standpoint, but it was partially b/c I recently discovered this Leslie Howard guy and his short but amazingly interesting career and was pleasantly surprised to find him in such a huge role as this; the first I'd seen of him in color, of course, and partially b/c Ashley was her dream man, not Rhett. She could have had anyone but she always wanted him until Rhett decided to leave her. This movie is so right-on. |
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Blib
Ghost writer
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Post by Blib on Feb 22, 2009 4:27:20 GMT
Funny, I saw this while scanning through the television today as well. It was at the movies end so I didn't turn the channel, but my girlfriend pointed out that she wanted to see it, so we are planning on both watching it for the first time soon.
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Post by arkadyrenko on Feb 22, 2009 12:57:03 GMT
I admire this movie on a technical term. It's one of the most well made movies in the history of cinema.
But i loath praticaly everything else about it, excluding Clark Cable's character.
The movie is a paen on the good ol' days of the south, when racism was the "d'uhhh" and slavery was the way the world should be. How awesome it was to be rich back then, how romantic. What bullshit!!!!
And the lead character, Scarlett O'Hara, i tell you, she hasto be on ofthe most obnoxious, irritating, hateful character ever to be put as protagonist in a movie. The frakking bitch would had been the major villain in some other movie.
I would automatically give this movie two more stars if, after then Rhett tells her to go fuck herself (of course, he uses far more polite words, the ass-kicking "Frankly, my dear, i don't give a damn"), the scene afterwards would be for Scarlett to blow her brains out. that would be a realy great happy ending. Not for the shrew, but for the audiences.
A racist movie with a completly misguided notion of the south that was chauvinist and retard in the 1930s, with a complete self-centered psycopathic bitch as the lead. Wow, they don't make them like they used to, do they?
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Capo
Administrator
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Post by Capo on Feb 23, 2009 16:04:54 GMT
I need to see this again, despite saying last time I had no intention of ever doing so.
From my memory: bloated rubbish.
... though it's easy to see why it's important, in terms of production and commercial success; and I admire its Selznickian attempt to match epic history with epic cinema.
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Post by arkadyrenko on Feb 23, 2009 17:33:41 GMT
We think alike on this, mio capo.
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Post by ronnierocketago on Mar 2, 2009 1:36:17 GMT
The closest thing we've got to a Selznick in Hollywood these days is maybe Spielberg, and even then that one is having trouble getting his LINCOLN funded.
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Post by arkadyrenko on Mar 2, 2009 22:32:01 GMT
Because, like, dude, the kids, like, dude, don't like, like, dude, history lessons, like, dude. It's not like the kewl, dude! Unless it's like ancient greek gays dudes pretending they aren't gay, like, dude, like in 300, dude!
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Post by ronnierocketago on Mar 3, 2009 4:45:41 GMT
Because, like, dude, the kids, like, dude, don't like, like, dude, history lessons, like, dude. It's not like the kewl, dude! Unless it's like ancient greek gays dudes pretending they aren't gay, like, dude, like in 300, dude! More like the studios don't want another MUNICH....well-made "Jews with Guns" picture where Spielberg was obviously personally motivated to give a fuck, but lose a shitload of money in theatres. What I don't get is, Spielberg is wealthy. Why doesn't he pull a Coppola and spend some of that billion-dollar fortune of his into LINCOLN and basically do whatever the fuck he wants? Last I checked, in trying to get a studio to approve, LINCOLN got its budget pared down to $50 million. The Beard wants that shit to happen, and I think it will. |
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Post by arkadyrenko on Mar 3, 2009 21:06:44 GMT
Spielberg's case is that he's a tit to DREAMWORKS. Coppola might have his own independent movies, and Spielberg has a whole studio to worry and provide for. It means he still is a slave to commercial considerations, through and through. So, in that regard, Spielberg is not independent as, say, George Lucas, who always has the SW and Indy cashcows, which always milks him tonnes of cash every year.
For all porposes, Spielberg doesn't own his biggest sucesses, they belong, first and foremost, to the studios who payed them. He gets residues, but not the primary revenues, if you know what i mean. DREAMWORKS is his baby, but as wel all know, it's a studio which always had shaky finances, ence it always shares production and distribution costs with other studios for each movie they make.
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Post by Robert C. on Mar 26, 2009 23:53:27 GMT
TCM is about to show British actor Leslie Howard in The Scarlett Pimpernel RIGHT NOW!!!
As I already stated in this thread, it's one of my favorite roles ever - Howard plays a witty and anecdotal hopeless dreamer who's smothered by women's affection and seen as aimless and wondering to some, but by night he's a Hero of the French Revolution... Our kind of guy.
This was his pre-GWTW role that really put him on the map for U.S audiences. He loved Hollywood and visiting America, having just visited here a few days before his death at the hand of the Luftwaffe in 1943. And when you know that back-story of him it really makes his role as the Scarlett Pimpernel all the more believable....this shit is REAL.
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Post by Robert C. on Jan 14, 2010 21:03:40 GMT
Re: Leslie Howard, the English actor who played Old-South dreamer "Ashley Wilkes"
In addition to being a propaganda hero and victim in WWII, Howard was a mentor to Humphrey Bogart so much so that Bogie and Bacall named their daughter Leslie after him.
It's said that the Englishman barely read the script (much less the novel) for this performance, and simply participated in the film in hopes that he would get a shot at producing one of his own films, which he did, a film that feature an early performance of Ingrid Bergman.
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