Gone with the Wind (1939)

I don't really need to tell you the Soplot of this film as everyone knows Katie Scarlett O'Hara (the amazing Vivien Leigh) ends up with Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) who is a drunk, borderline rapist asshole, but he does adore his daughter immensely, I do give credit where credit is due and certainly appears more devoted to little Bonnie Blue (Cammie King) than Scarlett. But after Scarlett announces that she wants no more children, worried over her figure, she banishes Rhett out of her bedroom and he finds satisfaction elsewhere.
For the film, Scarlett pines over the weak, spineless toad Ashley Wilkes (Leslie Howard) who is married to the lovely Melanie (Olivia de Haviliand), the only truly nice character in this film but even she isn't perfect, thrilled when Scarlett kills that Yankee who dares enter Tara (the plantation, which may as well be a character in the film). In fact, Melanie's the one who suggests they look in his knapsack and raid out his pockets.
So, I don't truly like any of the three main characters. Scarlett is strong and powerful but deep down, all she cares about is money, as she wants never to be hungry again but she loves male attention far too much. As her one wails "She'll be married three times and I'll be an old maid." I get it Suellen (Evelyn Keyes), I truly get it. If either of Scarlett's sisters end up getting married, we are never told.
Though the film is horribly dated, calling the African American slaves darkies and portraying two of three of them as dimwits (which is beyond offensive), it remains largely watchable and though it clocks in at nearly four hours, it does go by quickly as there is just so much plot to fit in.
Despite portraying unlikable characters, each performance is utterly great and Hattie McDaniel is truly great in the tragic scene after little Bonnie Blue's death when she tells Melanie of the unshowable (during the Hayes code) scenes between Scarlett and Rhett afterward. Rhett should have never gotten a pony for a four-year-old and should have never taught her how to jump, but I digress. Though there are clearly colorful backdrops during a number of scenes, the sets are brilliant and the extras remain in character, as you are actually the aftermath of the burning of Atlanta. The score is a masterpiece.
The main problem I have with it (other than there is far too little blood and gore to be totally realistic) is that the screenwriter, Sidney Howard, cuts out Scarlett's other two children (yes, that's right, she reproduced with both Charles Hamilton [Rand Brooks] and Frank Kennedy [Carroll Nye]), which is just gross to think about.
However, despite that problem and dated-ness of the whole thing, this nevertheless remains one of the greatest films of all time. Grade: A