Movie Review - Gone with the Wind

The review below was posted back in September of 2010.  Unbeknown to me, I apparently watched Gone with the Wind just four short years ago, but for some reason I had blocked it completely from my memory.  This past Wednesday, I watched this classic ten-time Academy Award-winning film again -- this time on the BIG SCREEN -- and I actually think my review below really still tells all my feelings about director Victor Fleming's epic.  

The film is about 45 minutes too long, but the soap opera is a surprisingly effective romance spearheaded by Vivien Leigh whose performance so easily could've stooped to over-exaggeration, but she somehow manages to reel it in with her character's sassy (read: bitchy) demeanor.  Scarlett O'Hara as a character really stands the test of time and Leigh is really giving a classic performance.

While I may not love Gone with the Wind as much as others, I can see why it's considered a classic.  From a cinematic perspective, it really is a work of art considering the era in which it was made.  It really does stand the test of time.  I only hope I remember in the years to come that I enjoy it...for some reason, this is a movie that I groan about whenever it's brought up as a "classic."  However, it deserves that moniker.  

Original Review from September 2010 is below:

Gone with the Wind (1939)

Starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Hattie McDaniel, Leslie Howard, and Olivia de Havilland 

Directed by Victor Fleming

The only problem with Gone with the Wind is that it's too long.  Clocking in at 238 minutes (that's two minutes shy of four hours) if you include the "entrance," "intermission," "entr'acte," and "ending" music as it would have been presented in 1939, the film slowly meanders along its soap operatic path.

Here we're presented with the Civil War -- North against the South -- but it really doesn't matter.  That's just the backdrop to the epic love story between the headstrong southern belle Scarlett O'Hara and the philandering Rhett Butler.  Rhett falls for Scarlett, but she's in love with the bland Ashley (that's a guy), but Ashley's marrying his cousin (as they were wont to do back then), the heartwarming Melanie.  Such drama!

Yes, it's silly, but the story is surprisingly effective.  I dare anyone to deny that Vivien Leigh's Scarlett O'Hara is a bitch, but that's what makes her so interesting.  Yes, she's the biggest flirt in all of Georgia which angers all the women in town, and, after she steals the men away from their ladies, she simply breaks their hearts, but she's really just a woman trying to make it in a male-dominated world.  While it may seem like she hasn't changed a bit from the opening reel to the closing one, the fact of the matter is, she really has grown to be self-sufficient (despite her endless reliance on men).  She did what was necessary to survive -- more than she ever thought she would be able to do.

And that's what makes her so attractive to the womanizing Rhett.  Clark Gable plays this Southern Casanova with wit and charm, always well aware of Scarlett's manipulations and never allowing her to walk all over him.  Plus, he gets to spout some great lines -- the most famous being "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn," but my favorite being "You need kissing badly.  That's what's wrong with you.  You should be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how."  Coming out of anyone else, it may sound silly and trite, but coming from Gable, it's kind of fantastic.  Without a doubt, both Gable and Leigh (the later of whom won an Oscar) are stellar here, rising above the melodrama and making the film much better than it has any right to be.

Aided by a rather touching performance from Olivia de Havilland as Melanie, the woman who unknowingly shatters Scarlett's dream of being with her perceived true love Ashley, and Oscar-winning Hattie McDaniel as Mammy, the house servant with the voice of reason, director Victor Fleming manages to pull out some amazing performances from his actors.  Fleming also crafts a beautiful looking film as well.  There are some wonderful shots here -- ones that resonate even hours later -- Scarlett walking through a field of wounded soldiers, a beautiful red-hued sunset at the O'Hara plantation named Tara to name just two.  The use of Technicolor (in its early stages) and a sweeping Max Steiner score are both stunning, adding some oomph to the already powerful images.

If only the film were an hour shorter.  A three-hour running time would've been perfect.  At four hours, this film's pushing its luck.

The RyMickey Rating:  B (9/2010)
The RyMickey Rating:  B+ (10/2014)

Movie Review - A Streetcar Named Desire

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

Starring Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter, and Karl Malden

Directed by Elia Kazan

"I don't tell the truth.  I tell what ought to be true."

Those are lines uttered by Blanche Dubois in Elia Kazan's telling of Tennessee Williams' "classic" A Streetcar Named Desire.  Personally, I think critics have been following Blanche's dictum for decades telling you that this film and the play from which it is derived are American hallmarks of drama.  We're supposed to believe that because of the pedigree of the director, screenwriter, and actors that come along with this presentation.  Well, let me be the one to counter this belief by saying that A Streetcar Named Desire is an overly melodramatic and overacted disappointment furthering this critic's notion that Tennessee Williams is one of the most overrated playwrights of the twentieth century.

The film stars Vivien Leigh as Blanche Dubois who visits her sister Stella (Kim Hunter) and brother-in-law Stanley (Marlon Brando) in New Orleans after she loses everything.  As the trio talk, bicker, and flat-out fight, Stella and Stanley begin to realize that Blanche may not be all right in the head and that everything she says to them may be some figment of her imagination.

First, I'm not sold on this being a fantastic piece of writing from Tennessee Williams.  To me, Williams is the melodramatic master of American theater.  Sure, many say his stuff is full of depth and deep meaning, but I always feel like I'm just watching overly exasperated people throw their hands about and raise their voices without ever speaking in a believable manner.  Sometimes these elevated emotional machinations work (here and here) and sometimes they don't (here).  To me, this filmed version falls into the latter category.

A huge reason for my disappointment stems from the performance of Vivien Leigh as Blanche.  Director Elia Kazan (who also directed the original Broadway incarnation of this work) fails to have Leigh tone anything down for the screen.  Everything -- from her line readings to her facial expressions to her body movements -- feels as if she's ACTING to the nth degree for the very last row of the balcony in a theater.  There's no ebb and flow to her character...no soft and loud...everything is simply blasted to the limit.  It certainly doesn't help that I simply don't get the character of Blanche.  I'm unsure if it's Leigh's portrayal that's throwing me off or the role itself, but I never felt the character had her past depicted well enough to explain why she was the way she was in the present.  And let's not even get started on how in the heck a well-rounded guy like Karl Malden's Mitch ever fell in love with the crazy Blanche.

Brando's solid for sure, but I just don't get this one at all.  Maybe I'd better understand it in a good theatrical production...or maybe it just needs a modern retelling minus the melodramatic moments.  Fortunately, as my loyal readers will soon discover, Woody Allen must've heard my plea.  Check back tomorrow for a review of a much better film with essentially the same premise.

The RyMickey Rating:  C-

Movie Review - Gone with the Wind

Gone with the Wind (1939)

Starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Hattie McDaniel, Leslie Howard, and Olivia de Havilland 

Directed by Victor Fleming

The only problem with Gone with the Wind is that it's too long.  Clocking in at 238 minutes (that's two minutes shy of four hours) if you include the "entrance," "intermission," "entr'acte," and "ending" music as it would have been presented in 1939, the film slowly meanders along its soap operatic path.

Here we're presented with the Civil War -- North against the South -- but it really doesn't matter.  That's just the backdrop to the epic love story between the headstrong southern belle Scarlett O'Hara and the philandering Rhett Butler.  Rhett falls for Scarlett, but she's in love with the bland Ashley (that's a guy), but Ashley's marrying his cousin (as they were wont to do back then), the heartwarming Melanie.  Such drama!

Yes, it's silly, but the story is surprisingly effective.  I dare anyone to deny that Vivien Leigh's Scarlett O'Hara is a bitch, but that's what makes her so interesting.  Yes, she's the biggest flirt in all of Georgia which angers all the women in town, and, after she steals the men away from their ladies, she simply breaks their hearts, but she's really just a woman trying to make it in a male-dominated world.  While it may seem like she hasn't changed a bit from the opening reel to the closing one, the fact of the matter is, she really has grown to be self-sufficient (despite her endless reliance on men).  She did what was necessary to survive -- more than she ever thought she would be able to do.

And that's what makes her so attractive to the womanizing Rhett.  Clark Gable plays this Southern Casanova with wit and charm, always well aware of Scarlett's manipulations and never allowing her to walk all over him.  Plus, he gets to spout some great lines -- the most famous being "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn," but my favorite being "You need kissing badly.  That's what's wrong with you.  You should be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how."  Coming out of anyone else, it may sound silly and trite, but coming from Gable, it's kind of fantastic.  Without a doubt, both Gable and Leigh (the later of whom won an Oscar) are stellar here, rising above the melodrama and making the film much better than it has any right to be.

Aided by a rather touching performance from Olivia de Havilland as Melanie, the woman who unknowingly shatters Scarlett's dream of being with her perceived true love Ashley, and Oscar-winning Hattie McDaniel as Mammy, the house servant with the voice of reason, director Victor Fleming manages to pull out some amazing performances from his actors.  Fleming also crafts a beautiful looking film as well.  There are some wonderful shots here -- ones that resonate even hours later -- Scarlett walking through a field of wounded soldiers, a beautiful red-hued sunset at the O'Hara plantation named Tara to name just two.  The use of Technicolor (in its early stages) and a sweeping Max Steiner score are both stunning, adding some oomph to the already powerful images.

If only the film were an hour shorter.  A three-hour running time would've been perfect.  At four hours, this film's pushing its luck.

The RyMickey Rating:  B