> PS, Clark Gable was EXACTLY how I imagined Rhett Butler in the > book...amazing. WOOF indeed!
I remember the first time I read the book I could hear him saying all of Rhett's dialogue in my head. It was almost like the character was written for him. Gable was very insecure about playing the part because of the high expectations that fans had. The novel was very popular and there was a lot of anticipation for the movie when it came out. Much like LOtR! I waited & waited for the re-release of GWTW after I'd read the book. It was about 1968 when they decided they would 'stretch' the film & make a 70 millimeter wide-screen movie out of it. All they did was blow it up & hack off the top & the bottom, totally destroying any kind of visual composition the film had. It wasn't until I saw a restored print some time in the 80s, I think, that I came to fully appreciate the movie. The term motion 'picture' really meant something in classic Hollywood movies. A well-crafted film had every shot composed so that images, characters, set-pieces, etc. were balanced and made into a 'picture' that was visually interesting. One of my favorites from GWTW is the scene where Prissy goes to find Rhett at Belle Watling's, just before the burning of Atlanta. We see Prissy down on the street from Rhett's perspective, looking out of a second story window. There is a street lamp in the upper left corner of the screen and Prissy is down in the lower right. It enhances the feeling of looking out of the window, down into the street and it balances the shot at the same time. Shots where there are groups of actors are all carefully arranged, almost like they are sitting for a family portrait. Well-made modern widescreen movies do have the same attention to composition but it's not always as evident. I love those old movies! Mark E.
