Long on hype, short on believable performances

Rating: 4/10 (17 August 2001)

I know this comment will be viewed as sacrilege from the vast majority of movie lovers. This is just one woman's opinion. I find Gone With The Wind to be one of the greatest pageants ever filmed. The opening scene at Twelve Trees is a dressmaker's dream. The breadth and depth of the cast is amazing. This is clearly a big-budget epic. There are many people who love grand-scale epics for, well, the sheer grandiosity of it. This is what makes movies such an individual experience. I am not one of those people.
I love believable characters, thoughtful premises, clever plot twists, terrific acting, and witty dialogue. Gone With The Wind has all of these things, but only a sampling of them. Clark Gable is tremendous as Rhett Butler and Ona Munson is unforgettable as Belle Watling. But (here comes more heresy) Vivian Leigh's over-the-top frenetic performance of Scarlet O'Hara is bad acting at its zenith. She is never anything but a cartoon. And, she is supposed to carry the film. Even worse is an insipid Leslie Howard as Ashley Wilkes. Hattie McDaniel is great as Mammy (It is a disgrace to realize that it was 62 more years before a Black woman could win another Oscar, also for Supporting Actress). But Thomas Mitchell is present in body only as Scarlet's father. The rest of the all-star cast fares much better in their bit parts.
This is one movie that has never lived up to its legend for me.