Gone with the Wind, featuring Hattie McDaniel

[jserraglio]

I've never ever seen this film, so I watched the first part this week ... before pouring a Guinness and cueing up my annual screening of the GOAT movie, "The Godfather".

Frankly, GWTW's a pretty damn thrilling watch. I like the way the women's skirts fill the frame in the early part of the flick. And I fell in love with Hattie McDaniel who steals the show--a veritable force of nature. But all told, "The Wizard of Oz" is a helluva lot better flick.


Drop-dead gorgeous Hattie McDaniel at age 15


HATTIE MCDANIEL with her brother SAM MCDANIEL in THE GREAT LIE (1941)

[Belle]

Absolutely priceless.

McDaniel played the same part in every one of her films. She was good in GWTW, but you saw that role over and over in all her subsequent films. It was the DIALOGUE she was provided in GWTW which was the distinguishing feature of her role. And she delivered it well, unlike Leslie Howard who was a faded English matinee idol entirely unsuited to the part (as he complained himself).

To suggest the Wizard of Oz is a far better 'flick' is a very silly comment. Insults not just toward the great screenwriter Sidney Howard (who was tragically killed before the film was released), composer Max Steiner, cinematographers Haller and Rennahan, director Fleming (who came into both pictures after a false start by Cukor) and, not least, the extraordinary production design of William Cameron Menzies...it's a film for adults. Some of the lines in the film are poetic, if not always so delivered. And Leigh seemed to forget her southern belle accent often enough (ah, the joys of non-linear continuity!).

The Wizard of Oz's one distinguishing feature was the extraordinary Judy Garland, some excellent production design and absolutely nothing else - except Tin Man, Lion and Scarecrow. Kitsch dwarves singing banal songs and thick, soupy music from Herbert Stothart. (Those dwarves sexually assaulted Garland, by the way, according to one interview I saw years ago with somebody who was on that film set.) Mervyn Le Roy was brought into the picture after Cukor and before Fleming as both the former weren't getting anywhere. He-man Vic Fleming came in to save the day - and stop Garland's incessant giggling which was costing money in re-shoots.

Garland rightly hated "Over the Rainbow" as a piece of juvenile kitsch filled with lyrics on the same level as Bing Crosby's "Would You Like to Swing on a Star". Great music. When you're 8.

[jserraglio]

A star is reborn: You came out of retirement in order to play your signature role — the chatty ma’amsplainer — and reprised it badly.

Those dwarves sexually assaulted Garland ... according to … somebody who was on that film set.

Not to complain, however. At long last! A third or fourth-hand hearsay plug for #MeToo, dated 1938 but a plug nonetheless!!

GWTW is for adults??!! Not unless you mean for old farts that linger long past their due date. GWTW is just as much a fantasy as is TWOO. You simply aren’t being forthright about it.

And to name just a couple dozen admirable but often type-cast actors off th’ top o’ me silly-Willy head — Mifune, Eastwood, Valentino, Bow, Wayne, Pickford, L. Gish. D. Gish, Gilbert, Gabin, West, Bara, Belmondo, Garbo, Delon, Monroe, C. Grant, Chaplin, B. Keaton, D. Keaton, Fields, Lloyd, Rin Tin Tin and Lassie— they all played more or less similar type roles in their movies. Repetitio est pater filmiorum!! 📽