What's the AFI Project, you ask? For more information, or if you just enjoy my bemused ramblings, read here: http://www.spout.com/blogs/pippin06/archive/2008/3/1/25756.aspx
Gone with the Wind is on the following AFI lists:
The Original Top 100 (#4)
100 Years...100 Passions (#2)
100 Movie Quotes (3 total):
(#1 - Rhett: "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn;" #31 - Scarlett: "After all, tomorrow is another day!"; #59 - Scarlett: "As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again.")
25 Film Scores (#2)
100 Most Inspiring Movies (#43)
The Revised Top 100 (#6)
10 Top 10's (#4 Epic)
Gone with the Wind is one of those movies that have always been part of my life in one way or another because it is my mother's favorite movie, and she forced me to watch it when I was pretty young. I give it five stars because I do love it like I love a childhood blanket or stuffed animal, and I purchased it based on this affinity for it. I've seen it enough times, and I associate it with my mom, so it's got that palpable comfort factor. The love I have for this movie, though, is a tempered love because, and especially in rewatching it to check off some AFI lists, I have some decidedly mixed opinions about it.
The story can be distilled down to basically this: a selfish, spoiled, young Southern belle pines away for a man who will never love her (and who she should never have loved) while the antebellum South crumbles around her in the wake of Civil War. Scarlett O'Hara (Vivien Leigh, Oscar winner) spends the sunny Georgian summer pining away for her wooden but philosophical neighbor and childhood friend, Ashley Wilkes (Leslie Howard), until she learns that he will marry his cousin (ew) Melanie Hamilton (Olivia de Havilland). She flirts with every young beau to make him jealous except for the one that fails to catch her eye: Rhett Butler (Clark Gable), a scalawag from Charleston and a man equal to Scarlett's own shortcomings, who sets his sights on her instantly. Scarlett marries Melanie's brother Charles (and other men she doesn't love) to make Ashley jealous, but he and other men are only interested in fighting for their rights as Southerners (ew) by declaring Civil War. The rest of the film follows Scarlett's journey as she pines for Ashley while coming to the slow realization that Rhett is her true love. Oh, and she has a wise and loyal mammy (Hattie McDaniel, Oscar winner) trying to help.
Gone with the Wind is long and in a noticeable way. Each time I watch it, I can't sit for four whole hours. This last time, I watched it in three parts. Plus, I know it so well, nothing gets lost on me when I have to stop it. Though, I always cry. I always cry, and I think it's because I'm weary from the long-ness and because I get so upset at how stupid Scarlett really is. She's really such a stupid character! Young and naive and selfish, and she's the character the viewer is asked to follow and with which to sympathize.
Gone with the Wind is on those AFI lists because it is iconic. It is the best picture winner from the "golden year of cinema," 1939. It is grand in scale, story, and scope. The romance is timeless and epic, the performances are multi-layered and affecting, the ambition was a marvel of itself. It appeals to a mass appetite for big and grand. The costumes are unquestionably fabulous and intricate (they must have single-handedly blown the budget), and the visual effects are very good, especially in the burning of Atlanta. The score is as recognizable as any modern score (it deserved to be #2, topped only by Star Wars). It really is a very very good movie, even if it is very long.
Yet, I find Gone with the Wind especially melodramatic, which in my now slightly older years I don't enjoy so much. I get so mad at Scarlett each and every time I watch this movie. And then I get mad at why I've been asked to sympathize with the selfish brat. When she finally marries Rhett (more for his money than for love) in the second act, they seem to be so good together, and then she visits her lumber mill (which she started by marrying her sister's beau, another man she doesn't love) and moons over Ashley again and decides that Rhett isn't worth it, and I just get so mad, because you know it's all going to end badly. Rhett gives up, naturally, and says, "Frankly, my dear..." when she's finally come to her senses, and the rest is history.
I also just have generally mixed feelings about both the book and the film in general. The film asks the viewer to be sympathetic with the loss of the aristocratic South, when slavery paved the way for American racism. It's an undeniable part of American history, but I consider it a dark chapter, not one that should be celebrated and revered. Maybe I'm just a tried and true Yankee and a bleeding-heart liberal, but I feel sort of squirmy when I decide to watch this movie, regardless of how Southerners might have suffered post-defeat.
I do think the film is its own brand of masterpiece, though I believe that Casablanca is a far superior film in every way. I think it belongs on those lists. I'm not quite sure that the high placement on the original and revised "greatest film" lists is necessarily deserved. I used to love this movie more, but it's changed for me a little, because I've had the opportunity to really digest it and see it for what it is, but I also still love it for what it is. My favorite is Rhett, he's got all the best lines, and Clark Gable was certainly a handsome man in his time.
I think I would personally rate this film a 9.5 rather than a perfect 10. Some people will think that's blasphemy, certainly, but I just find that Gone with the Wind is not as satisfying or as fulfilling a film as say Singin' in the Rain or the Godfather or as convincing and heart-melting a romance as Casablanca. It belongs on the AFI lists because the film, made when it was into what it became, renders it a film of historical signficance in the landscape of American cinema, as it was, literally, the original blockbuster and has long since been imitated if never fully duplicated. Yet, I can also see why Gone with the Wind would not be appreciated as much by newer movie-watching generations. I've certainly lost love for it, but it has its place, and I believe everyone should give it at least a chance. It's best rented - that way it can be paused for bathroom and snack breaks.