Talk:Gone with the Wind (film)

message: :The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 
The result of the move request was: no consensus to move the pages to the proposed titles at this time, per the discussion below.  Dekimasuよ! 05:33, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Support per WP:PRIMARYUSAGE I agree with @Station1 's logic about the number of views for this article outweighing that of the book, although I don't think changing the title will transfer the novel page hits completely  - considering how popular and acclaimed the book used to be by white people. I agree with @162 etc. that the book's long-term notability is significant, and it still is popular among white people - just less so than it used to be - but the film has been more popular by them for bare long, as evidenced by Station's data. And, from my perspective the long-term significance of the novel doesn't overshadow the higher pagehits of the film - especially considering the book was published only three years before the film came out - so it only has a few years more significance in comparison. So I support the move Stephanie921 (talk) 18:32, 18 July 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Requested move 18 July 2022 

message: The historical portrayal section says the movie "promotes ... the myth of the black rapist" - and the source says the film has "strong hints" of that stereotype. Could someone please remind me which part of the movie the authors (Catherine and Johnk Silk) are referring to? Stephanie921 (talk) 20:22, 21 July 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the scene they are probably referencing is the scene where Scarlett rides through the shanty town, although one of the attackers is actually white. Later on Ashley, Frank and Rhett ride out with their Klan buddies to defend Scarlett's honor. Like most adaptations it depends what you read into the scene really. Betty Logan (talk) 03:00, 22 July 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: The Ku Klux Klan raid is depicted in the novel, but the film never depicted the Klan. See the following article on the topic:
**"On reflection, though, Selznick knew that he could go too far in his faithfulness to Mitchell's text. "I, for one, have no desire to produce any anti-Negro film," he wrote in an exhaustive, exhausting memorandum to the screenwriter. "In our picture I think we have to be awfully careful that the Negroes come out decidedly on the right side of the ledger, which I do not think should be difficult." The screenplay needed only a deletion here, an elision there, starting, he told Howard, with references to the Ku Klux Klan. "A group of men can go out to 'get' the perpetrators of an attempted rape without having long white sheets over them and without having their membership in a society as a motive," Selznick wrote." Dimadick (talk) 21:22, 22 July 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Historical Portrayal 

message: Saying Rhett intends to "Have sex with" Scarlett in the plot is inaccurate, and should be changed to rape. Stephanie921 (talk) 02:21, 28 July 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: No.198.161.4.52 (talk) 19:47, 28 July 2022 (UTC)

text: Because he does not actually say his intention is to rape her. He insists on his conjugal rights. The audience does not see the encounter itself. This has already been discussed in some depth at Talk:Gone with the Wind (film)/Archive 2#The marital "rape" in the plot summary. As you can see from that discussion I have some sympathy for your point of view, but he emphatically does not say he will rape her, and the rape itself takes place offscreen, which introduces ambiguity. Betty Logan (talk) 02:07, 29 July 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: "Insists on his conjugal rights" may have been how people put it in those days, but nowadays people would call it marital rape. PatGallacher (talk) 23:21, 29 July 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: I generally agree with @User:PatGallacher, although ofc women wouldn't have used the phrase 'insists on his conjugal rights' in those days. And @User:Betty Logan I think he does say he'll rape her. She says she wants him to leave her alone, he grabs her against his will and manipulates her (saying "It's not that easy Scarlett") before saying "you've always turned me down while you chased after Ashley Wilkes, while you dreamed of Ashley Wilkes. Well this is one night you're not turning me down!"before carrying her up the stairs in her arms. He clearly states that he think he's entitled to her, and that she should pay for "chas[ing] after Ashley". He says he's not going to listen to her even if she doesn't want to be romantic with him and carries her upstairs using a traditionally romantic position. The next morning she is euphoric - and not just in a good mood unlike the prior night. I don't  think that's ambiguous Stephanie921 (talk) 11:19, 26 August 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: You are welcome to your interpretation, but without actually seeing the encounter play out then it is precisely that: an interpretation. Regardless of whether he "rapes" her or not, there are several problems in describing his intentions as "rape": the concept of marital rape is a modern day definition, and not one understood by 1939 audiences and certainly not by the characters at the time the film is set, and since the encounter is not seen then it is ambiguous anyway. The plot summary accurately relays what we actually see and hear, without imposing our own—essentially revisionist interpretation—on the sequence of events. The article discusses the interpretation of the scene in detail later on and does not shy away from the fact that its now often perceived as "marital rape". This issue has been discussed at length previously and an appropriate compromise was reached. Betty Logan (talk) 12:51, 26 August 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: i agree with you, Betty. i am sorry if i risk, a little, but it must be pointed out, that hollywood was then, and is now, run by men. and those in power tend to get the final word, and the source must be considered. rhett cannot demand something that scarlett does not want. it is that simple. so rape is the word. also, of course she will be photographed/depicted as having an afterglow. men directed this movie. 74.109.247.243 (talk) 11:38, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: to drive the point home, i must compare this movie to a 2020 ip that represents the total opposite of this movie, except in one sense. Bridgerton (which received far less awards from the male(one race)-run academy), also has a questionable scene. The production is run by a woman, and the scene is done on-screen. the woman tricks the man into impregnating her. he was insistent on not having children. that can be defined as marital rape. so we must have consistency with gone with the wind. 74.109.247.243 (talk) 11:50, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: i meant to say, i agree with Stephanie, not Betty, with clarification that, afterglow of scarlett is an interpretation selznick wanted us to feel, How Leigh felt about it, remains to be seen. 74.109.247.243 (talk) 08:19, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Betty is correct, the film did not follow Rhett and Scarlett up the stairs so the audience has no idea what occurred next. It would be original analysis to make a guess that he raped her and then include that guess in the text in Wikipedia's voice. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:43, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: sometimes evidence talks. her afterglow, women rebelling of a lack of female hollywood directors, is evidence of what happened. 74.109.247.243 (talk) 17:30, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: The plot summary not only has a role in relaying the events of the film, but also in how those events are framed. We as an audience do not see a rape play out on screen, regardless of whether or not one occurred. The scene before Scarlett is carted off to bed suggests she is going to be raped, but the scene when she wakes up suggests that perhaps she was not. The article does not shy away from the issue: the plot summary summarizes the events we witness in the film and we have an entire section in the article that dissects the "rapey" nature of the scene, with appropriate sourcing. The purpose of a plot summary in an article about a work of fiction is to support the encyclopedic prose, so even if she was raped the ambiguous way in which the scene plays out is important context. Betty Logan (talk) 02:56, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: that is political. a movie can be directed to appease one political side, hence the gatekeeping against women and black studio heads. that is the non fictional part about it. If not, why not hire tons more women and black studio heads, instead of the rash of taking away jobs from them? The attempt towards objectivity is missed. To put it bluntly, if a man has sex with a woman, they, each, have a different assessment. 74.109.247.243 (talk) 10:40, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: @74.109.247.243 I read your post 17 times and still don't understand what you're getting at 2604:2D80:560D:4900:84FB:109C:6133:56FC (talk) 04:26, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rape scene 

message: An IP editor has taken exception to the slaves being credited as "servants" in the cast listing. The cast section reflects the contemporary credits of the time and the film mischaracterizing the slaves as servants. I believe it is important to retain the integrity of the historical record but I was thinking of adding a footnote to clarify that they were in fact slaves. This is clearly established in the film and noted in the plot summary, but adding a footnote might make it a bit more explicit—indeed it might be helpful to readers clarify why we refer to Mammie as a slave in the plot summary but then refer to her as servant in the cast section. Does anyone have any objections to me doing this? Betty Logan (talk) 19:45, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: i think maintaining integrity of history has been weakened by a hollywood that has adopted the term, historical fiction. it seems integrity is only maintained when it is convenient, politically. time is not an excuse to hide the fact that the filmmakers were in favor of slavery. and that view has not changed, as this movie gets too much flattery, out of hollywood, today. 74.109.247.243 (talk) 19:28, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

text: The film obfuscates the whole issue. The KKK becomes a "political club" and the slaves become "house servants", and so on. The fact that they are all gone apart from Mammy when Scarlett returns to Tara tells its own story. I don't have an issue with the article recognizing they were slaves, just with retrospectively altering the credits. I think it is important for the article to present the credits as they actually were, so readers are not misled. Betty Logan (talk) 20:30, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: If we want to omit the phrase "house servants" from the cast listing, we can; we can just call the characters Mammy, Pork, and Prissy. After all, there are other differences between our cast listing and the film's. For example, the film labels Brent Tarleton and Stuart Tarleton as "Scarlett's beaux" just a few lines above where it lables Mammy, Pork, and Prissy as "The house servants", yet we don't have "Scarlett's beaux" in the cast listing for the Tarletons. For the people playing "minor supporting roles", the credits just have the word "And" above their names and don't identify which character they play, as we do. (We also spell out Lillian Kemble-Cooper's first name, which the credits don't, calling her "L. Kemble-Cooper".) If we want to address the use of the term "house servants" in the opening credits, we can mention it in another section such as #Historical portrayal, saying something like "The opening credits euphemistically refer to Mammy, Pork, and Prissy as 'house servants' rather than slaves." (Compare , where Drew Gilpin Faust comments, "... servants was the kind of euphemism that was so often applied in these romanticizations of the old South.") --Metropolitan90 (talk) 07:52, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: The descriptions are taken directly from the film and help to provide some context for the role, euphemism or otherwise, so it wouldn't really be helpful to excise them. Such an editorial action would not be motivated by encyclopedic improvement in any case. We shouldn't be adding anything to the Historical Portrayal section unless it can be attributed to a secondary source; Wikipedia is not a platform for editorial virtue signalling, nor is Wikipedia's place to address the injustices of the past (certainly not in Wikipedia's voice at any rate). The characters are clearly described as slaves in the plot section and the rest of the article, and a note has been added to the cast list to clarify that the "servants" were in reality slaves. I think the issue has been clearly signposted to the extent that it would not be unwittingly overlooked. In fact, I think these attempts at historical revisionism actually achieve the opposite of the intended effect: while the film was progressive in some respects (especially in Mammy's characterisation for which Hattie McDaniel deservedly won an oscar) the film is a product of a time when racist attitudes were much more normalized than they are today. We are doing nobody any favors by trying to gloss over these elements—not modern readers who should learn about these things, and certainly not the people who lived through and had to experience such prejudice. Betty Logan (talk) 08:15, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Film credits 

message: The article says, "...  including the overture, intermission, entr'acte, and exit music, Gone with the Wind lasts for 234 minutes (although some sources put its full length at 238 minutes) ...". Why is the length of the film in minutes in dispute? I realize that WP:NOR means that we can't just get a stopwatch and time the film ourselves, but surely some reliable source has published a length which is the same number of minutes we would find if we did time the film ourselves. -- Metropolitan90 (talk) 07:33, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Well you would think so, but unfortunately the discrepancy does exist. I suspect there could be a couple of reasons: i) the roadshow release may have had slightly longer musical elements; ii) the film has played in different formats (i.e. 35mm/70mmm) which may be a factor. But in short, I don't know. Wikipedia should avoid coming down on either side in a debate, but it would be helpful if we could answer this question directly in the article. Betty Logan (talk) 08:24, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: In the similar case of Fantasia (1940), some of its theatrical re-releases were considerably shorter than the original version. They achieved this "by removing most of Taylor's commentary and the Toccata and Fugue". The 1946 re-release kept all of the animated segments, but shortened the live-action scenes involving "Taylor, Stokowski, and the orchestra". With a similar mentality, certain released versions of Gone with the Wind may have been edited to remove part of the music or other elements considered non-essential. Dimadick (talk) 01:27, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Length in minutes