Gone with the Wind

***NOTE - I am not going to be discussing the racial issues and glorified portrayal of the antebellum south in this review. I acknowledge that the movie's romanticizing of the south, glib dismissal of the horrors and realities of slavery, and general support for the "lost cause" mentality are all horrible and unacceptable. However, my standing policy for reviews is that, unless political and social issues are central to the point of the movie (e.g., 2004's Crash), I avoid discussing it in my review. But I don't want it to be conspicuously absent, so, this is my way of acknowledging and agreeing that Gone With The Wind's portrayal of these elements is, to say the least, reprehensible.*** One of my favorite shows is Gilmore Girls. I love the fast-paced, witty dialogue. I love how the relationship of Luke and Lorelai play out (until the end of the sixth season, that is). But upon a full rewatch a few years back, there was something I didn't notice until then: just how much a terrible human being Rory is. She is told from birth she is the most important person who ever lived, and she acts like it. Her sense of entitlement, her refusal to even conceive that she has flaws or could be in the wrong, her callous disregard for the feelings of others if they inconvenience her, her inability to understand why the world outside of her family and Stars Hollow don't think she's Jesus Christ, her ability to make herself the center of the universe no matter what, and her obliviousness to her privilege. She is the worst. And she never learns, Ever. Not even accidentally. Anyway, that's Scarlett O'Hara. And Gone With The Wind forces the viewer to spend four (4) hours with this toxic, unappealing, snot-nosed little bitch. And find her sympathetic. And cry when she falls. AND ROOT FOR HER. No. Lest you think I'm showing a sliver of misogyny here, Rhett Butler is terrible too. Glib, smug, self-assured, obnoxious, selfish, and there's that one scene in the last ... hour? I don't know, time stopped having any meaning when I watched this ... where he commits marital rape (and in the next scene, Scarlett wakes up with the biggest "I GOT SO LAID" smile, which, ewwwwww). Rhett sucks. He may be up front about being a selfish heel, but being self-aware about one's own suckage and still reveling in it does not diminish said suckage. FOUR HOURS WITH THESE TWO, circling each other, hating then liking then hating then liking then hating then liking then hating then liking each other. To watch Gone With The Wind is to watch two people who absolutely should not even be in the same hemisphere as one another, force themselves into each other's orbit and inflict misery upon misery on one another, for a decade in movie time and FOUR FUCKING HOURS in real time. Yes, the color is beautiful, and yes, the cinematography is lush and gorgeous, and yes, Clark Gable and Vivian Leigh have fantastic presence. But that doesn't change the fact that I spent four hours watching two of the worst characters ever portrayed in a movie manipulate and abuse everyone around them, including each other, and the movie has the audacity to expect me to cheer for them. The movie actually thinks that, when Rhett FINALLY wakes up to Scarlett's toxicity (albeit not having learned anything about his own) and dumps her and she gets all "I'm gonna find a way to win him back", I'm supposed to hope it all works out for the two crazy kids. I do not, movie. I do not. I'm not going to "WeEl AcKsHuAlLy" this movie's historical significance and place in cinema. It is a sweeping epic, the kind of Old Hollywood movie modern cinema can't even imitate. Clark Gable and Vivian Leigh were MOVIE STARS, all caps. The direction is magnificent, the sets amazing, the costumes gorgeous. But historical significance and the individual aspects that are unimpeachable don't change the fact that sitting through this was a death march. This was not a tragic tale of star-crossed lovers; this was two awful people taking four hours to come to the conclusion anybody with a brain stem arrived at in 30 minutes.