Gone with the Wind Movie: Key Facts

Gone with the Wind Movie Key Facts

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Full title: Gone With the Wind

Director: Victor Fleming

Lead Cast: Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara, Clark Gable as Rhett Butler

Supporting Cast: Leslie Howard, Olivia de Havilland, Hattie McDaniel, Thomas Mitchell, Barbara O’Neil, Ona Munson, Butterfly McQueen, Alicia Rhett, Evelyn Keyes, Carroll Nye

Producer: David O. Selznick

Writer: Sidney Howard (Screenplay adapted from novel by Margaret Mitchell)

Genre: Drama; romance

Language: English

Awards

1939 Academy Awards:

Won: Best Actress (Vivien Leigh), Best Supporting Actress (Hattie McDaniel), Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, Best Director, Best Film Editing, Best Picture, Best Screenplay (Sidney Howard),Technical Achievement Award (An honorary award for outstanding achievement in the use of color to enhance dramatic mood)

Date of release: December 15, 1939

Setting (time & place): Atlanta, Georgia and the surrounding countryside during the Civil War and first part of the Reconstruction Era

Foreshadowing: In Gerald O’Hara’s first scene, the audience learns that Gerald has long been chided for the recklessness of his jumps. Later, it is one of these jumps that finally ends his life.

Major conflict: Scarlett struggles to survive and prosper during the Civil War and Reconstruction Era.

Rising action: Part One: Scarlett sees the man she loves married to another woman and escapes to Atlanta, where she is forced to confront the horrors of the rising tide of the Civil War.

Climax: Part One: Scarlett finally makes it back home to Tara only to find her mother dead, her father sliding into madness, and her beloved plantation a looted shell.

Falling action: Part One: After seeing the full extent of the destruction, Scarlett swears she will do whatever she has to in order to never go hungry again.